Brazil's marine biodiversity to be celebrated in ten-book series

Seven categories of coastal habitat will be covered, with analysis of the role of biodiversity in ecosystem services.

By Maria Fernanda Ziegler  |  Agência FAPESP – Brazil’s marine biodiversity is to be celebrated in a series of ten books in English for students, researchers and anyone interested in knowing more about the coastal environments of Brazil.

The series editor is Alexander Turra, a professor at the University of São Paulo’s Oceanographic Institute (IO-USP). He says Brazilian Marine Biodiversity is the outcome of steadily expanding research that began with the creation of the Benthic Coastal Habitat Monitoring Network (ReBentos), supported by FAPESP under the aegis of an agreement with the National Council for Scientific & Technological Development (CNPq) to consolidate the National Biodiversity Research System (SISBIOTA). ReBentos is linked to the Global Climate Change Research Network (Rede Clima) via its Coastal Zones sub-network. 

“Little has been published in English on Brazilian biodiversity, and the approach we use in this series is new,” said Turra, one of the founders of ReBentos. “We describe the habitats in terms of ecosystems and threats to habitats as well as biodiversity, so we detail more functional aspects of these environments.”

The Brazilian coast, with all the diversity of its vegetation and ecosystems, is capable of storing millions of tons of carbon, making Brazil a good place to test new mechanisms for the assessment and conservation of blue carbon – CO2 stored in coastal ecosystems.

The scarcity of long-term studies of Brazilian biodiversity makes Brazil a global laggard in evaluating the impact of environmental changes on coastal systems. One of the roles played by ReBentos is to extend knowledge of this subject not only in academia but also among students and the general public.

With the aid of SISBIOTA, it has been possible to structure the network of researchers who study marine biodiversity and climate change. “In large measure, ReBentos brought about the study in Brazil of this marriage between climate change and benthic organisms,” Turra told Agência FAPESP.

ReBentos links 166 researchers in 57 higher education and research institutions in Brazil and elsewhere who are studying all 17 of Brazil’s coastal states.

The series will comprise ten books. Seven will address sub-categories that ReBentos uses to characterize the habitats of benthic organisms: estuaries, rhodolith beds, rocky shores, sandy beaches, vegetated bottoms, mangroves and salt marshes, and coral reefs. The other three will focus on marine and coastal environmental education, shallow continental shelf habitats, and deep-sea habitats.

“The series presents an analysis of the role of biodiversity and the importance of ecosystem services. It also addresses the threats to each habitat from pollution, invasive species and global environmental change,” Turra said.

The series Brazilian Marine Biodiversity will comprise the following books:

1) Estuaries Editors: Paulo da Cunha Lana (UFPR) and Angelo Fraga Bernardino (UFES)	Estuaries are coastal ecosystems that include a variety of habitats with their own dynamics, fauna and sediments. The combination of hydromorphological and climate changes represents a grave threat to estuarine ecosystems on a global scale.
2) Deep-sea habitats Editors: Paulo Yukio Gomes Sumida (USP), Angelo Fraga Bernardino (UFES) and Fábio Cabrera De Léo (University of Victoria)	Deep-sea habitats are an important part of Brazil’s territory and, when included in calculations, are responsible for an increase in Brazil's biodiversity.
3) Shallow continental shelf habitats Editor: Paulo Yukio Gomes Sumida (USP)	The continental shelf is one of the most endangered marine habitats in Brazil. Not only fishing but also oil and gas exploration and production are major threats to biodiversity.
4) Marine and coastal environmental education Editors: Natalia Pirani Ghilardi Lopes (UFABC) and Flávio Berchez (USP)	Marine and coastal environmental education is all the more important because of the changes these environments have undergone. These changes negatively affect Brazil’s ecosystems. Nevertheless, only 32 contributions relating to this topic have been published in Brazil to date.
5) Rhodolith beds Editors: Paulo Antunes Horta (UFSC), Marina Nasri Sissini (UFSC) and Pablo Riul (UFPB)	Coastal rhodoliths form an oasis of high biodiversity among seabed sedimentary environments. These layers of non-geniculate coralline red algae and their components represent extraordinary carbonate biofactories.
6) Rocky shores Editors: Ricardo Coutinho (IEAPM) and Ronaldo Christofoletti (UNIFESP)	In Brazil, rocky shores are found mainly on the coast of the South and Southeast regions. There are various types of substrates and marine landscapes, and these have significant environmental heterogeneity and host high levels of biodiversity.
7) Sandy beaches Editors: A. Cecília Z. Amaral (UNICAMP), Guilherme Nascimento Corte (UNICAMP) and Hélio Hermínio Checon (UNICAMP)	Brazil’s sandy beaches constitute a key ecosystem that has socio-economic value and supplies ecosystem services. They play an important role in the maintenance of human populations and in the conservation of biodiversity.
8) Vegetated bottoms Editors: Margareth da Silva Copertino (FURG) and Joel Christopher Creed (UERJ)	Seagrasses are among the most endangered ecosystems on Earth. Knowledge of the predominant patterns and processes governing seagrasses along the Brazilian coast is important to global discussions of climate change.
9) Mangroves and salt marshes Editors: Yara Schaeffer-Novelli (USP), Catarina Lira (Rio de Janeiro Botanic Garden Research Institute, IP-JBRJ), Guilherme Abuchahla (BiomaBrasil Institute) and Gilberto Cintrón-Molero (BiomaBrasil Institute)	Brazil has one of the world’s largest areas of mangroves. Certain characteristics of mangroves and salt marshes make them extremely sensitive to environmental change and hence excellent indicators of such change.
10) Coral reefs Editors: Rodrigo Johnsson (UFBA), Elisabeth Neves (UFBA), Zelinda Leão (UFBA) and Ruy Kenji P. Kikuchi (UFBA)	The different types of coral reef in Brazil suffer from the effects of human action, especially increasing sedimentation owing to the removal of the Atlantic rainforest and the presence of industrial and urban effluents.

The books will be published beginning in the second half of 2017 by Springer and sold via its website. More information: springer.com/series/15050.