Collection of the Research Infrastructure 'Réseau des Zones Ateliers'

Réseau des Zones Ateliers (RZA) is a national research infrastructure (RI) that brings together the Zones Ateliers (ZA) labelled by CNRS Ecology & Environment. Some ZA have existed for over 35 years, and the network itself began to emerge in the early 2000s. Designated as a SOERE (Long-Term Environmental Research Observation System) in 2011, the RZA was officially recognized as a research infrastructure in 2018. It is unique in the French research landscape, with a primary focus on socio-ecosystems (SES).

Since 2020, the RZA has been working in synergy with the OZCAR RI (Critical Zone Observatories) to contribute to the development of the European eLTER infrastructure (Long-Term Ecosystem Research).

There are currently 16 Zones Ateliers embedded in diverse territories: 14 in mainland France, one in the Southern Territories, and one in Zimbabwe. These are geographical zones—often regional in scale—structured around functional units such as a river and its watershed, a mountain range, a coastal zone, or agricultural and urban landscapes.

Research conducted within the RZA aims to understand the functioning and trajectories—past and future—of these SES, along three main axes:

• Formalizing and theorizing the functioning of socio-ecosystems;

• Describing, understanding, and predicting the responses of more or less human-impacted SES to global changes;

• Contributing to the transformation of territories toward greater sustainability.

The RZA adopts a systemic approach that combines long-term, broad interdisciplinarity—across life sciences, Earth sciences, engineering, and the humanities and social sciences—with strong transdisciplinarity. This transdisciplinarity involves the co-construction of knowledge with socio-economic stakeholders, in a transformative perspective for territories. This is fundamental research, developed with and for society.

This HAL collection gathers the scientific outputs resulting from research carried out within the Zones Ateliers. Its purpose is to disseminate knowledge for and with society, fostering co-construction and dialogue between science and territories.

Find below the collections of the Zones Ateliers:

1. Collection of Zone Atelier Alpes LTSER-ZAA
2. Collection of Zone Atelier Arc Jurassien LTSER-ZAAJ
3. Collection of Zone Atelier Armorique LTSER-ZAAr
4. Collection of Zone Atelier Bassin du Rhône LTSER-ZABR
5. Collection of Zone Atelier Brest Iroise LTSER-ZABrI
6. Collection of Zone Atelier santé-environnement Camargue LTSER-ZACAM
7. Collection of Zone Atelier Environnementale Urbaine LTSER-ZAEU
8. Collection of Zone Atelier Hwange LTSER-ZAHG
9. Collection of Zone Atelier Loire LSTER-ZAL
10. Collection of Zone Atelier Moselle LTSER-ZAM
11. Collection of Zone Atelier Plaine et Val de Sèvre LTSER-ZAPVS
12. Collection of Zone Atelier Pyrénées-Garonne LTSER-ZA-PYGAR
13. Collection of Zone Atelier Environnementale Rurale Argonne LTSER-ZARG
14. Collection of Zone Atelier Seine LTSER-ZAS
15. Collection of Zone Atelier Antarctique et Terres Australes LTSER-ZATA
16. Collection of Zone Atelier Territoires Uranifères LTSER-ZATU

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