Biological monitoring: lichens as bioindicators of air pollution assessment - a review

Often as part of environmental impact studies and, above all, to obtain aut horisations in accordance with prescriptions from the Ministry for the Envi ronment (Italy), surveys and controls that use biological indicators are re quired. This is because such indicators are valid instruments for evaluatin g the quality of the air ensuing from the subject (often an industrial plan t) of the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA). In this context, this pape r aims to analyse some of the theoretical aspects of biological monitoring and to provide a progress report on the use of lichens as bioindicators of air quality, with a particular eye to the situation in Italy. The object of this paper is that of pointing out the most important lines in the current state of knowledge in this field, evaluating the methodological applicatio ns and their advantages/disadvantages with respect to traditional surveying methods. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.