The Ligurian Sea and the National Biodiversity Future Centre (NBFC): Biodiversity Conservation in a Temperate Marine Environment under Threat
A special issue of Diversity (ISSN 1424-2818). This special issue belongs to the section "Marine Diversity".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 31 December 2024 | Viewed by 14483
Special Issue Editors
Interests: biodiversity; zoology; marine ecology; polar sciences
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Interests: marine zoology and biology; sponges; cnidarians
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
2. National Biodiversity Future Center (NBFC), Piazza Marina 61, 90100 Palermo, Italy
Interests: biodiversity; zoology; marine ecology; polar sciences
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
The Italian National Recovery and Resilience Plan (2021–2027), is part of the NextGenerationEU—large-scale structural action undertaken to transform European countries into healthier and greener places and effectively protect and preserve the natural environment.
To this end, Italy established the National Biodiversity Future Centre (NBFC), a consortium of national universities, research centres, associations, private and societal stakeholders that will utilise modern technologies and frontier research to monitor, conserve and restore Italian biodiversity, enhancing the shift towards sustainable use of biodiversity-derived resources.
Within this context, the Ligurian Sea, a deep basin in the northernmost sector of the western Mediterranean which exhibits peculiar hydrodynamic and meteo-oceanographic features, has been identified by the NBFC as a key area of interest.
Although the Ligurian coastline is among the most urbanized and industrialized areas in the Italian peninsula, due to littoral urban development and harbour activities, it hosts a number of Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) of high relevance, including the world-renowned Portofino Promontory MPA, a Specially Protected Area of Mediterranean Interest (SPAMI) since 2005 and a Long Term Ecological Research (LTER) site since 2007. The Ligurian Sea is also included in the Pelagos Sanctuary, an international ~25,500 km2 marine-protected area in the Mediterranean.
The huge amount of data focusing on marine communities and species of the Ligurian coasts offers enormous potential for understanding the effect of multiple stressors, as well as for the refinement of biodiversity conservation tools. This point is crucial since most existing MPAs were designed without considering the stressors of climate change and there is an urgent need to update current management strategies to allow a more adaptive approach.
With this Special Issue of Diversity, we aim to promote the publication and sharing of future-proof data for the National Biodiversity Future Centre (NBFC) focusing on the Ligurian Sea and on all aspects of marine biodiversity, from molecules, genes and populations, and scaling up, to species and communities.
We welcome contributions presenting recent advances in biodiversity, taxonomy and species conservation sharing the vision of NBFC goals. Contributions do not have to specifically refer to MPAs, provided the Ligurian Sea is considered, and may focus on all groups of organisms, not just key species.
Prof. Dr. Schiaparelli Stefano
Prof. Dr. Giorgio Bavestrello
Dr. Alice Guzzi
Guest Editors
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