The mission of the C-PALEO laboratory is to develop knowledge of wetlands in temperate, boreal, subarctic and arctic regions of North America. The laboratory studies the impacts of climate change and human activity on several types of wetlands (marshes, swamps, open, forested and permafrost peatlands). Projects carried out in this laboratory aim to :

1. Study wetlands as paleoenvironmental archives of the Holocene based on biotic and geochemical indicators preserved in organic deposits.
   • Understand the factors influencing long-term carbon sequestration in these ecosystems over the last millennia.
   • Reconstruct the evolution of ecological and hydrological conditions in these environments in relation to climatic variations over the Holocene.
2. Document the carbon budget of natural and disturbed wetlands
   • Evaluate carbon sequestration rates in soils and plant biomass.
   • Evaluate terrestrial atmospheric carbon fluxes (CO₂ and of CH₄).
   • Quantify lateral river carbon fluxes, including dissolved organic carbon (DOC) and particulate carbon (COP).
3. Quantify and map wetland carbon stocks.

The C-PALEO laboratory aims to train undergraduate and graduate students and postdoctoral researchers. Most projects are carried out within the Centre GEOTOP and the Groupe de recherche interuniversitaire en limnologie (GRIL). The work carried out in this laboratory contributes to a better understanding of the carbon sequestration function of wetlands. This research contributes to better wetland management and to the development of policies to mitigate climate change.