LM1 buoy

The monitoring buoy LM1 is deployed in Lake Maggiore in the Pallanza basin (about 50 m from the shoreline, anchored at a depth of about 40 m). The buoy has been developed in-house and conceived as a low-cost modular system. It is equipped with sensors for pH, conductivity, dissolved oxygen - surface (1.5 m depth) and deep (10 m depth) - and algal pigments (Chl-a, both at surface and deep, phycocyanin (PC) and phycoerythrin (PE) at surface), a thermistor chain, a weather station, and a live webcam (https://www.meteolivevco.it/boa-limnologica-sul-lago-maggiore/). Sensors used for pigment monitoring (Cyclops7, Turner Design) include two Chl-a sensors (surface and deep) which were deployed from 2020, and one PC and one PE sensors which were added in March 2021. Each sensor is wire connected to the electronic control unit, which has been specifically designed within the project for the signal acquisition from the sensors, data storage, basic data elaboration, and wireless transfer.