Researchers of Porto University publish their work at Biological Reviews

The prestigious international magazine in the field of biological sciences, "Biological Reviews" has published an article on the work developed by the international team led by CIBIO-InBIO researchers, Sérgio Ávila, Carlos Melo, Ricardo Cordeiro and Lara Baptista, to convey the new information on biological research, namely climate change impact in marine biodiversity.

This study shows that in ocean volcanic islands, global climate change can impact differently the evolution of marine and land species.

"A new model is presented as it gathers historic and ecological aspects that influence the geographical distribution of species in shoreline and marine ecosystems. We also integrate data from different areas of biology, palaeontology and geology that had not yet been correlated", states Sérgio Ávila, the first author of the article.

The result is a new model of marine biogeography with predictive capacity, showing that preview climate changes and the consequent changes to the sea level have influence the evolution of marine biodiversity and land biodiversity in different ways.

"One of our main goals was to understand the impact of sea level change in marine organisms around volcanic islands", adds Sérgio Ávila.

This new study presents data from eleven islands and islands groups in the Atlantic Ocean, to better understand the evolution of marine species in different volcanic areas and to better apprehend the biodiversity of these ecosystems, in the framework of island biogeography.

CIBIO-InBIO is managed by ICETA - Instituto de Ciências, Tecnologias e Agroambiente da Universidade do Porto, a non-profit private institution at the University of Porto which benefits from administrative and financial autonomy. Besides its headquarters at the University of Porto, CIBIO-InBIO has poles at the Universities of Azores, ISA - Instituto Superior de Agronomia/School of Agriculture, DGPC - Directorate-General for Cultural Heritage/Secretary of State of Culture, in Lisbon, and ISCED-Huíla (Higher Institute of Educational Sciences of Huíla) in Angola.