Contents Foreword List of participants Hutchinson’s heritage: the diversity-disturbance relationship in phytoplankton by U. Sommer, J. Padisak, C. S. Reynolds & P. Juhasz-Nagy Disturbance events affecting phytoplankton biomass, composition and species diversity in a shallow, eutrophic, temperate lake by B. A. Jacobsen & P. Simonsen Stress and disturbance in the phytoplankton community of a shallow, hypertrophic lake by K. Olrik & A. Nauwerck Diversity and succession of the phytoplankton in a small lake over a two-year period by P. Eloranta Phytoplankton succession and diversity in a warm monomictic, relatively shallow lake: Lake Volvi, Macedonia, Greece by M. Moustaka-Gouni Hypertrophic phytoplankton and the Intermediate Disturbance Hypothesis by C. Rojo & M. Alvarez Cobelas Disturbance-diversity relationships in two lakes of similar nutrient chemistry but contrasting disturbance regimes by U. Sommer Importance of intermediate disturbances for the species composition and diversity of phytoplankton in two very different Berlin lakes by I. Chorus & G. Schlag Seasonal succession of phytoplankton and its diversity in two highly eutrophic lakes with different conditions of stratification by I. Trifonova Seasonal fluctuations in the diversity and compositional stability of phytoplankton communities in small lakes in upper Bavaria by R. Holzmann Ecology of the phytoplankton of the River Moselle: effects of disturbances on community structure and diversity by J.-P. Descy Some notes about the Intermediate Disturbance Hypothesis and its effects on the phytoplankton of the middle Orinoco river by H. I. Carvajal-Chitty Effects of the water discharge on periphyton abundance and diversity in a large river (River Danube, Hungary) by E. Acs & K. T. Kiss The influence of different disturbance frequencies on the species richness, diversity and equitability of phytoplankton in shallow lakes by J. Padisak Vili Scales of disturbance and their role in plankton ecology by C. S. Reynolds Notes on compositional diversity by P. Juhasz-Nagy Intermediate disturbance in the ecology of phytoplankton and the maintenance of species diversity: a synthesis by C. S. Reynolds, J. Padisak & U. Sommer General index