Invading the Mediterranean Sea: biodiversity patterns shaped by human activities
By Stelios Katsanevakis, Marta Coll, Chiara Piroddi, Jeroen Steenbeek, F. Ben Rais Lasram, Argyro Zenetos, Ana Cristina Cardoso. Frontiers in Marine Science, 2014
324 citations recorded by the source corpus.
Human activities, such as shipping, aquaculture, and the opening of the Suez Canal, have led to the introduction of nearly 1,000 alien species into the Mediterranean Sea. We investigated how human activities, by providing pathways for the introduction of alien species, may shape the biodiversity patterns in the Mediterranean Sea. Richness of Red Sea species introduced through the Suez Canal (Lessepsian species) is very high along the eastern Mediterranean coastline, reaching a maximum of 129 species per 100 km2, and declines towards the north and west. The distribution of species introduced by shipping is strikingly different, with several hotspot areas occurring throughout the Mediterranean basin. Two main hotspots for aquaculture-introduced species are observed (the Thau and Venice lagoons). Certain taxonomic groups were mostly introduced through specific pathways – fish through the Suez Canal, macrophytes by aquaculture, and invertebrates through the Suez Canal and by shipping. Hence, the local taxonomic identity of the alien species was greatly dependent on the dominant maritime activities/interventions and the related pathways of introduction. The composition of alien species differs among Mediterranean ecoregions; such differences are greater for Lessepsian and aquaculture-introduced species. The spatial pattern of native species biodiversity differs from that of alien species: the overall richness of native species declines from the north-western to the south-eastern regions, while the opposite trend is observed for alien species. The biodiversity of the Mediterranean Sea is changing, and further research is needed to better understand how the new biodiversity patterns shaped by human activities will affect the Mediterranean food webs, ecosystem functioning, and the provision of ecosystem services.
Subfields: Ecology, Global and Planetary Change
View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/89fab190c946abc40a8f8ff755157254779ea84f
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In Ecology
In Global and Planetary Change
- Argyro Zenetos
- M. Çınar
- C. Bianchi
- E. Ballesteros
- M. Verlaque
- M. Gambi
- Stelios Katsanevakis
- M. Bilecenoğlu
Citations in the corpus
- Unpublished Mediterranean records of marine alien and cryptogenic species (2020, background): “Biological invasions, often facilitated by climate change, have been considered as a major driver of change in Mediterranean marine ecosystems (Katsanevakis et al. 2014a; Azzurro et al. 2019a; Morri et al. 2019) with important impacts at all levels of biodiversity (Katsanevakis et al. 2014b).”
- A lionfish (Pterois miles) invasion has begun in the Mediterranean Sea (2016, background): “There are now >1000 alien species in the Mediterranean and the majority are thermophilic species that have entered the eastern basin through the Suez Canal (Katsanevakis et al. 2014).”
- Species diversity, taxonomy and distribution of Chondrichthyes in the Mediterranean and Black Sea (2020, background): “This sea constitutes a complex marine ecosystem within which elasmobranchs play a basic role in controlling trophic relationships (Katsanevakis et al. 2014).”
- Mapping the impact of alien species on marine ecosystems: the Mediterranean Sea case study (2016, background): “…range from singlespecies interactions and reduction in individual fitness of native species to population declines, local extinctions, changes in community composition, and effects on entire ecosystem processes and wider ecosystem function (Blackburn et al., 2014; Katsanevakis et al., 2014a).”