Cold-region rivers and lakes are changing faster than the models built to manage them. AuroraTech is a collaborating partner, and a co-founder of half the project budget, in an International Atomic Energy Agency Coordinated Research Project led by a Greek technical university on isotope-enabled digital twins for predictive surface-water characterization across Nordic and Arctic environments. Stable and radioactive isotope tracers are combined with hydrological monitoring and modelling into digital twins that explain where river water comes from, how snowmelt, groundwater and rainfall mix through the season, and how the system will respond to warming. AuroraTech’s funding supports masters’ students and early-career researchers on the project, and the group’s hydrochemistry specialists contribute to the isotope and water-quality work.
Outcome: isotope-constrained digital twins of Nordic and Arctic surface-water systems, a trained cohort of young researchers, and a method that AuroraTech brings to water authorities in Finland and the wider Nordic region for predictive management of rivers and lakes under climate change.
Location
Nordic and Arctic catchments, with Finland as AuroraTech’s base
