Published in Frontiers in Marine Science
Exposure to a variety of anthropogenic stressors has prompted the creation of a growing number of marine protected areas (MPAs). Unfortunately, long-term changes in both the sources of stress and the extent or operation of the MPAs have also occurred, at a pace that is often faster than the research trying to understand the consequences of those ch...
Published in Frontiers in Marine Science
An increased reliance on imagery as the source of biodiversity data from the deep sea has stimulated many recent advances in image annotation and data management. The form of image-derived data is determined by the way faunal units are classified and should align with the needs of the ecological study to which it is applied. Some applications may r...
Published in Frontiers in Marine Science
The relevant benefits of hyperspectral sensors for water column determination and seabed features mapping compared to multispectral data, especially in coastal areas, have been demonstrated in recent studies. In this study, we used hyperspectral satellite data in the accurate mapping of the bathymetry and the composition of water habitats for inlan...
Published in Frontiers in Marine Science
Bryozoan assemblages of three mesophotic habitats, recently found in the Adriatic and Ionian Seas, were investigated in terms of species composition and diversity, colonial growth forms, and species ecological affinity, with the purposes to analyze variations and similarities between the different bioconstructions and to compare the mesophotic asse...
Published in Frontiers in Marine Science
The implementation of the European integrated marine policy poses many scientific challenges. Among them, the knowledge and understanding of interactions between anthropogenic pressures and ecological components is an important issue, particularly to help define Good Environmental Status, environmental targets and monitoring programs of the Marine ...
Published in Frontiers in Marine Science
Sabellaria alveolata is a sedentary gregarious tube-building species widely distributed from southwest Scotland to Morocco. This species builds what are currently considered the largest European biogenic reefs in the bay of Mont-Saint-Michel (France). As an ecosystem engineer, S. alveolata generates small to large scale topographic complexity, crea...
Published in Frontiers in Marine Science
There is a growing emphasis on formally recognizing the connection to the marine environment of Indigenous peoples and the traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) these strong connections cultivate. The potential for TEK to significantly enrich the scientific comprehension of the marine environment, whilst also celebrating the rich bio-cultural know...
Published in Frontiers in Marine Science
The term vulnerable marine ecosystem (VME) was introduced to facilitate the spatial management of deep-seas, identifying those habitats vulnerable to anthropogenic disturbance, such as trawling. Consistent interpretation of the VME definition has been hampered by an underlying paucity of knowledge about the nature and distribution of deep-sea habit...
The introduction of ecosystem-based management measures for Baltic fisheries to achieve Good Environmental Status (GES) within the MSFD (Marine Strategy Framework Directive) and the HELCOM (Baltic Marine Environment Protection Commission) requires tools that can evaluate measures to reduce the spatial footprint on the seabed. We applied the DISPLAC...
