Dispersal is an essential process in population and community dynamics, but is difficult to measure in the field. In freshwater ecosystems, information on biological traits related to organisms' morphology, life history and behaviour provides useful dispersal proxies, but information remains scattered or unpublished for many taxa. We compiled information on multiple dispersal-related biological traits of European aquatic macroinvertebrates in a unique resource, the DISPERSE database. DISPERSE includes nine dispersal-related traits subdivided into 39 trait categories for 480 taxa, including Annelida, Mollusca, Platyhelminthes, and Arthropoda such as Crustacea and Insecta, generally at the genus level. Information within DISPERSE can be used to address fundamental research questions in metapopulation ecology, metacommunity ecology, macroecology and evolutionary ecology. Information on dispersal proxies can be applied to improve predictions of ecological responses to global change, and to inform improvements to biomonitoring, conservation and management strategies. The diverse sources used in DISPERSE complement existing trait databases by providing new information on dispersal traits, most of which would not otherwise be accessible to the scientific community.

Centre of Molecular and Environmental Biology Department of Biology University of Minho Braga Portugal

Departamento de Zoología Facultad de Ciencias Universidad de Granada Avenida Fuente Nueva s n 18071 Granada Spain

Department of Aquatic Ecology Eawag Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Sciences Überlandstrasse 133 CH 8600 Dübendorf Switzerland

Department of Botany and Zoology Faculty of Science Masaryk University Kotlářská 2 61137 Brno Czech Republic

Department of Ecology and Hydrology Biology Faculty Murcia University Campus de Espinardo 30100 Murcia Spain

Department of Environmental Science Policy and Management University of California Berkeley Berkeley CA 94720 USA

Department of Hydrobiology University of Pécs Ifjúság útja 6 H7624 Pécs Hungary

ECOEVO Lab E E Forestal Univesidade de Vigo Campus A Xunqueira 36005 Pontevedra Spain

ECOTEC Environment SA 1203 Geneva Switzerland

Finnish Environment Institute Freshwater Centre Paavo Havaksen Tie 3 FI 90570 Oulu Finland

Grup de Recerca Freshwater Ecology Hydrology and Management Diagonal 643 08028 Barcelona Catalonia Spain

INRAE UR RiverLy centre de Lyon Villeurbanne 5 rue de la Doua CS70077 69626 Villeurbanne Cedex France

Institute of Science and Innovation for Bio Sustainability University of Minho Braga Portugal

School of Science and Technology Nottingham Trent University Nottingham NG11 8NS UK

Université de Lorraine CNRS UMR 7360 LIEC Laboratoire Interdisciplinaire des Environnements Continentaux F 57070 Metz France

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Temporal niche dynamics of spreading native invertebrates underlie doubling of richness in pristine temperate streams

The recovery of European freshwater biodiversity has come to a halt

Multidecadal changes in functional diversity lag behind the recovery of taxonomic diversity

DISPERSE, a trait database to assess the dispersal potential of European aquatic macroinvertebrates