Marine angiosperms form highly productive, complex and ecologically important ecosystems, so their conservation is essential. Unfortunately, various threats have been documented that are reducing the conservation status of natural populations. To know the current state of conservation of endemic marine angiosperms in the Tropical Atlantic Ocean, a bibliographic review has been carried out on the advances in knowledge made between 2006 and 2021 about their distribution, population dynamics, threats and in situ and ex situ conservation strategies. The most studied species in this time is Thalassia testudinum Banks & Sol. Ex K.D. Koenig and, in addition, it is the one that has the greatest number of in situ conservation strategies implemented. However, in general, the results on distribution, population dynamics and threats are limited for the rest of the species considered in this work. Regarding ex situ conservation, it is scarce for all the species studied and only two of them (T. testudinum and Syringodium filiforme Kütz) have material preserved in germplasm banks. Halophila baillonis Asch. Ex Dickie is the species to which the least conservation strategies have been applied, probably due to the fragmentation of its populations. Finally, in order to improve the conservation status of the seagrasses studied in the present work, it would be necessary to carry out in the future new studies on the taxonomy, distribution, seed physiology and in vitro culture.
Now we closed the publication phase and launched the post-publication phase of the conference.
REVIEWWWERS'08 Brainstorming Workshop is Now Open from 2023-Jan-01 to 2023-Jan-31.
MOL2NET Committee, Authors, and Validated Social Media Followers Worldwide
Invited to Post Moderated Questions/Answers, Comments, about papers.
These are my Questions (Q) to you, please kindly post your public Answers (A) below
to promote scientific discussion and training of conference readers :
Q1. Considering the threats to marine angiosperms, why do you think there are no policies in place to protect this species?
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Thanks for your question. We think that there are many policies to protect this species in situ, but we could not record them completely in this research because we only screened scientific literature in this systematic review (please, check the search strategy in Materials and Methods). Further research on this topic should include a wider range of literature (laws, technical documents, etc.) in order to have a complete view on the (legal) protection of seagrasses. Also, some very important scientific information to assess the conservation status of wild populations is still lacking for the most of species, including the research on Plant Biotechnology and management of germplasm ex situ. In this regard, it would be advisable for scientific community, we all, to focuss on the most important parameters to be studied in order to make a good follow-up of the conservation status of this plants, and to provide reliable information to governments, and NGOs,l and other key organizations devoted to Biodiversity Conservation (such as the Internation Union for Nature Conservation, IUCN).
Hope I answered your question.
Jorge.
Before designing a proper conservation strategy we should have an accurate picture on the real conservation status, and needs for each species in a given area.
For this, it would be advisable for scientific community, we all, to focuss on the most important parameters to be studied in order to make a good follow-up of the conservation status of this plants, and to provide reliable information to governments, and NGOs,l and other key organizations devoted to Biodiversity Conservation (such as the Internation Union for Nature Conservation, IUCN). As an "emergency measure" (especially if there are threatened plants in non protected sites) I would try to harvest germplasm, and make a stock of plantlets ex situ, while studying the conservation measures, and restoration success.
Hope I answered your question.
Jorge.
