Impacts of relative sea-level rise on coastal wetland biodiversity: lessons from fossil insects

Giovedì, 14 Febbraio ore 14 Aula C

Presso il Dipartimento di Scienze della Terra, Pisa, il Dr. Yoann Poher (Institut Méditerranéen de Biodiversité et d’Écologie marine et continentale, Aix Marseille Université -Fr) terrà un seminario dal titolo:"Impacts of relative sea-level rise on coastal wetland biodiversity: lessons from fossil insects"

Mediterranean coasts are projected as one of the most vulnerable areas to climatic and anthropogenic changes, mainly due to the ever-increasing relative sea level and human population. Among the most pressing questions related to these threats is how the coastal biodiversity will be impacted. Coastal wetland-based archives have an exceptional scientific potential to observe past biodiversity changes and identify key thresholds for particular ecosystems facing relative sea-level rise. Using fossil insects as main bioindicator to reconstruct the biodiversity and habitat changes, supplemented by pollen and geochemical data, I will present the long-term environmental history of two Corsican coastal wetlands located in different contexts: one on a low-laying island and the other on a deltaic floodplain. The two sites show contrasted ecosystem trajectories, and the results demonstrate the influence of the geomorphological context and land-use in the responses of these wetlands to Holocene relative sea-level rise.