Title: wetland
Long Title: IUPAC Gold Book - wetland
DOI: 10.1351/goldbook.15136
Status: current

Definition
Area of land consisting of soil that is saturated with moisture, such as a swamp, marsh, or bog.

Notes
1) As defined in terms of physical geography, a wetland is an environment "at the interface between truly terrestrial ecosystems and aquatic systems making them inherently different from each other yet highly dependent on both".
2) Wetlands are ecotones. Wetlands often host considerable biodiversity and endemism.
3) In many locations such as the United Kingdom and United States, wetlands are the subject of conservation efforts and biodiversity action plans (BAPs).

Related Terms
- biodiversity: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/14479
- biodiversity action plans: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/14480
- conservation biology: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/14547
- conservation ecology: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/14548
- ecotones: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/14620
- endemism: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/14633
- soil: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/15036

Source
- PAC, 2009, 81, 829. 'Glossary of terms used in ecotoxicology (IUPAC Recommendations 2009)' on page 963 (https://doi.org/10.1351/PAC-REC-08-07-09)

Other Outputs
- html: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/15136/html
- json: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/15136/json
- xml: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/15136/xml

Citation: Citation: 'wetland' in IUPAC Compendium of Chemical Terminology, 5th ed. International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry; 2025. Online version 5.0.0, 2025. 10.1351/goldbook.15136
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Accessed: 2026-04-21T10:18:04+00:00