Page - 61 - in Biodiversity and Health in the Face of Climate Change

61 (1) Japan (KH-3000) (Kawashima et  al. 2017), which until now has been able to provide information only on one pollen type (Cryptomeria japonica, Cupressaceae family) and not on the complete pollen diversity, (2) the USA (Pollen Sense) (http:// pollensense.com/), where it is still under calibration and not in fully operational mode, (3) Switzerland (PA-300 Rapid E) (Crouzy et  al. 2016), where it is under calibration, and (4) Germany (BAA500), which has been in fully operational mode for the last half decade (e.g. Oteros et  al. 2015; Häring et  al. 2017). The aforementioned automated pollen measuring device in Germany, the BAA500 Pollen Monitor, is an automated pollen monitoring system that is able to successfully  recognise more than 10 pollen taxa, among which the allergenic Alnus, Artemisia, Betula, Corylus, Fraxinus, Poaceae and Taxus (Oteros et  al. 2015). This system uses an image recognition algorithm on batch-collected pollen. The obtained pollen data exhibit a delay of only 3 h (Oteros et  al. 2015). Oteros et  al. (2015) have reported that the BAA500 manages to correctly identify all different pollen types in >70% of all cases (except for Salix pollen), with false-positive reports only occur- ring rarely. 3.8 Conclusions and  Future Challenges Climate change has been responsible for changes in biodiversity and species rich- ness. Air quality, vegetation and land use changes, plant diversity and distribution have been altering pollen seasons, pollen abundance and allergenicity. In a changing world working towards optimum health management, it is crucial to take quick counter-measures, as suggested below. First, a reliable, fully operational, real-time aeroallergen monitoring programme across the globe, needs to be urgently implemented, and must include all allergy- implicated pollen types, mainly birch, grasses and ragweed. This also includes set- ting up an automated system of free dissemination of the obtained results. Automated monitoring ought to be extended to other allergenic bioaerosols as well, such as the notorious fungal spore types of Alternaria and Cladosporium: if we consider that we spend more than two-thirds of our life indoors, at home or at work, it is critical that we evaluate the exposure risk and consequent symptoms due to indoor aeroal- lergens  as well. Secondly, special attention must be paid to changing aeroallergen seasons and spatial variability as this could increase sensitisation rates. Invasive plant species like ragweed and relevant eradication programmes have to be focused on. Likewise, Alternaria growth and production of spores have to be extensively investigated in the frame of future climate change, as it has been reported that this will dramatically change in 2100 climatic scenarios, growing faster but likely producing fewer spores, thus indicating an alteration in life strategy (Damialis et  al. 2015). It is crucial that all research approaches reflect real-life conditions as much as possible; it is important to focus mainly on the interaction effects between plant 3 Climate Change and  Pollen Allergies