General Coordination Centre (Hub) of the European project, located in Murighiol, Tulcea county. It will provide leadership and coordination for the entire research infrastructure, as well as key scientific, educational and analytical capabilities, and will also function as a laboratory for the Danube Delta Supersite samples.

The Hub is made up of research laboratories. The Hub will also include facilities for collaboration with other ESFRI projects and milestones with which there is an agreement to use the Danube Delta Supersite.

The essential motivation in the design of the Hub was determined by the specificity of research activities on biological phenomena in a permanent interdependence with environmental factors using modern methods, without affecting the environment.

The main functionality is the biosphere-specific research activity in river-sea systems (with direct application in the Danube Delta area, as a particular case) in a disciplinary field of wide diversity. In this plan, the main research branches are distinguished, comprising activities in the field of life sciences in the Danube Delta biotope (representative for other river-sea systems at European and world level), earth sciences and aquatic ecosystems. The Hub building with a built area of about 15.500 sqm is dimensioned as having a research and auxiliary staff capacity of about 130 permanent staff and about. 150 people of a fluctuating nature (guests, staff attracted during peak periods, visitors

The DANUBIUS-RI Hub will also play an important role in the provision of DANUBIUS-RI services. DANUBIUS-RI services form the core of the infrastructure activities. They will address the needs of a wide range of stakeholders, including primarily researchers, but also policy makers, environmental authorities, businesses and students.

The hub is proposed to be a green building with an area of approx. 15.000 sqm on land under the administration of INCDSB. The construction consists of a multi-purpose building (administrative, conference and workshop spaces, an IT centre), two buildings with research laboratories for life sciences and earth sciences - in total 17 research laboratories equipped with state-of-the-art equipment including a logical data analysis flow and sample traceability, a building for aquaculture research and a mesocosm. For the construction of the Hub, all the required approvals and agreements have been taken through the town planning certificate, in accordance with HG 907/2016.

The Danube Delta Supersite is the most important complex natural laboratory in the project, located in the Danube-Danube Delta-Black Sea system.

The Danube Delta Supersite is composed of 7 field stations (Murighiol, Chilia Veche, Maliuc, Sulina, Jurilovca, Sf Gheorghe, Grindu) 16 observation areas / 52 observation points and boreholes.

The Danube Delta Supersite is a system of field stations and observation points providing access to the entire Danube-Danube Delta-Black Sea system

Field stations(7) are bases for field work, have facilities for processing and storing primary samples and have a role in the maintenance of observation points.

The field station laboratories in the field will cover the primary processing of samples collected in the field. For each station there are from one to six observation points, they have multiple technical design and multiple sensors in each location which, to cover the full spectrum of scientific objectives perform repeated measurements.

Selection of sites for the purpose of obtaining scientific data and information necessary for the complex and interdisciplinary study of the system according to the DANUBIUS-RI scientific agenda and for each site scientific objectives were defined

The Danube Delta Supersite facilitates access to the Lower Danube and the Black Sea. Investment in scientific facilities will provide the basis for developing interdisciplinary research capacity for studying the Lower Danube - Danube Delta - Black Sea system.

Danube-Danube Delta-Black Sea System

With a catchment area of over 817,000 km2, it crosses 10 countries and 4 capitals, Danube River has since the 7th century played an important economic role as a waterway and a cultural role beyond, supporting the development of important European cities such as Regensburg and Ulm in Germany, Linz and Vienna in Austria, Bratislava in Slovakia, Budapest in Hungary and Belgrade in Serbia.

Danube Delta is a museum of biodiversity after 30 types of ecosystem, it is the newest land in Europe (it grows by 40 m every year) and the second largest delta in Europe after the Volga Delta and the 23rd largest in the world (~5 800 km2).

Researchers have so far identified 5,380 species: of flora: 1,839 species and fauna 3,541 species, it is the largest and most compact reed bed in the world (240,000 ha) and the richest ornithological fauna in the world (more than 250 species).

Black Sea has an area of over 430,000 km2 and is surrounded by 6 countries: Bulgaria, Romania, Ukraine, Russian Federation, Georgia and Turkey

Both the Black Sea and the Danube River have been known since ancient times as a major navigation route linking Asia and Europe, and their geo-strategic importance is still recognised today.