Recruitment and development of marine assemblages on artificial substrata: which is the best material to prevent loss of biodiversity?
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1
Facultad de Biología, Universidad de Sevilla, Departamento de Fisiología y Zoología, Spain
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2
Laboratorio de Vigilancia y Control de la Contaminación de Palmones, Agencia de Medio Ambiente y Agua, Spain
Nowadays, more than 27 thousand harbours encompass coasts all over the world and construction is expected to be increased in the future. The development and apply of new ecological engineering ideas over both old and new structures is now imperative in order to reduce perturbation on marine coastal biota and to avoid the spread of non-native species. In this study, an early settlement of intertidal and subtidal benthic community is tested on five artificial substrata: biogenic sandstone (Sn), limestone (L), gabbro (G), slate (Sl) and concrete (C). Roughness and chemical composition of substrata were measured to learn about substrata characteristics. On intertidal level, results show that primary productivity and diatoms abundance increased markedly with substrate roughness, because surface micro-features allow lower desiccation stress and faster colonization by algae. On subtidal study, early colonizing community did not change markedly among substrata, although coverage was higher on L and diversity was higher on L, Sn and Sl. Differences found are related to intrinsic substrate type characteristics. These differences showed concrete, the most widely used artificial substrata, holding relatively poor ecological benefits on first phases of ecological succession. Results may also help to promote future research on this field and to test different substrata combinations and substrata heterogeneities for more ecologically sustainable surfaces on future costal structures design.
Keywords:
Ecological Engineering,
Artificial substrata,
roughness,
Chemical composition,
benthic community,
species richness,
diversity
Conference:
XIX Iberian Symposium on Marine Biology Studies, Porto, Portugal, 5 Sep - 9 Sep, 2016.
Presentation Type:
Oral Presentation
Topic:
2. GLOBAL CHANGES, INVASIVE SPECIES AND CONSERVATION
Citation:
Sempere-Valverde
J,
Ostalé-Valriberas
E,
Martín-Farfán
G and
Espinosa
F
(2016). Recruitment and development of marine assemblages on artificial substrata: which is the best material to prevent loss of biodiversity?.
Front. Mar. Sci.
Conference Abstract:
XIX Iberian Symposium on Marine Biology Studies.
doi: 10.3389/conf.FMARS.2016.05.00033
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Received:
29 Apr 2016;
Published Online:
02 Sep 2016.
*
Correspondence:
Mr. Juan Sempere-Valverde, Facultad de Biología, Universidad de Sevilla, Departamento de Fisiología y Zoología, Sevilla, Spain, juansempere91@gmail.com