Editorial-ozone and plant life: the Italian state-of-the-art

It is the Editorial Policy of Environmental Science and Pollution Research to periodically publish a Special Issue to communicate to a broad constituency of the scientific community timely information about specific topics in the environmental sciences. A Special Issue consists of assembled papers that both identify and describe the status and extent of our knowledge concerning new or existing ecotoxicological problems. This is the case of ground-level ozone, primarily an air pollutant, which is of high concern in Europe due to its effects on human health, vegetation and materials. Ozone is not directly emitted into the atmosphere; instead, it is formed from chemical reactions in the presence of sunlight, following emissions of precursor gases. Meteorological conditions play essential rules in these reaction chains and also influence the transport of ozone and its precursors, so that year-to-year differences in pollution levels may be relevant (EEA 2016).