The Institut de Ciències del Mar (ICM) is the fourth largest research institute of the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC) and the largest dedicated to marine research. Under the motto “Ocean Science for a Healthy Planet,” the ICM conducts frontier research and foster both knowledge and technology transfer on topics related to ocean and climate interactions, conservation and sustainable use of marine life and ecosystems, and impact mitigation of natural and anthropogenic hazards. In-depth knowledge, determined action, and coordinated management are essential to confronting these global challenges, thereby driving sustainable development of humankind. “Exploring the effects of stressors and forcing processes on marine ecosystems” (https://www.icm.csic.es/en/research-group/functioning-and-vulnerability-marine-ecosystems) is a multidisciplinary group within the ICM the main purpose of which is to explore the effects of stressors and forcing processes on marine ecosystems with special attention to living resources and human activities. The goal is to understand the vulnerability and resilience of marine ecosystems under anthropogenic stress, with special focus on fisheries, aquaculture, and climate change, providing management and conservation actions. The objectives are structured in four research Lines:
(1) Development of scientific tools for the ecosystem-based fishery management,
(2) Functional biodiversity and vulnerability of marine ecosystems,
(3) Physiology, reproduction, immunology, ecotoxicology and functional genetics in natural and
cultured marine species, including fish animal models (i.e., zebrafish, Danio rerio), and
(4) Technological solutions for monitoring ecosystems and animal behavior. For this, the team
members employ empirical (laboratory and field) and modelling approaches.
CSIC team
Jacopo Aguzzi
The acquisition and treatment of data generated by new technologies is one of the greatest and most relevant challenges in marine science. Dr. Jacopo Aguzzi has more than 15 years of research experience in using underwater cabled observatories and their docked robotic mobile counterparts for the long-term (from months to years and decades) ecosystem monitoring and characterization of animal behaviour in situ. The overarching goal of his research is to relate the presence (and behaviour) of marine species to overall changes in sampled richness and biodiversity at different temporal scales and under environmental control regimes.
His research is also focusing on the use of animal-borne, miniature electronic tags (biologgers) that are attached to a wide range of taxa to track and monitor vagile species in the wild. These tools also have the capacity to simultaneously measure environmental parameters driving individuals’ behaviour, and diel, tidal, seasonal, and inter-annual (i.e., Lotka-Volterra dynamic based) demographic patterns in ecological communities. All those technologies and data collection practices are pursued for the establishment of best monitoring approaches to extract ecological indicators compliant with EU policy requirements. To date Dr. Aguzzi participated in 170 research articles, 6 book chapters, and in more than 200 National and International conferences. He is the manager for the “ecological monitoring” and “citizen science” of the EMSO Testing-Site OBSEA (www.obsea.es). From 2016 to 2019, he was a Scientific Advisor for the Ocean Network Canada (ONC) for the Section “Life in the Environments of the Northeast Pacific Ocean and the Salish Sea”. He is presently participating in different international Committees-Bodies, for example, the Working Group on Nephrops Surveys (WGNEPS) of the International Council for the Exploitation of the Sea (ICES).
Damianos Chatzievangelou
Biologist by trade, specialized in applying computational ecology approaches for the intelligent monitoring of marine ecosystems with robotic platforms. MSCA postdoctoral fellow and member of the “ecological monitoring and indicators task force” within various national and international projects of ICM-CSIC (Department of Renewable Marine Resources). Within the framework of SunBio, my focus will be on the tasks relevant to monitoring biodiversity and ecological impact (T2.6 “Definition of habitat types and marine species to be targeted, monitoring and definition of ecological performance indicators”, T4.4 “Marine species behaviour and habitat condition evaluation” and T4.5 “Assessment of environmental impact”).
Giacomo Picardi
Giacomo is a post-doctoral fellow at the Instituto de Ciencias del Mar (ICM-CSIC). He obtained a PhD in Biorobotics at the Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna in Pisa, Italy (SSSA). In 2022, he was awarded a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions Individual-Fellowship (BluE – ID: 101061354) to conduct postdoctoral research at ICM-CSIC on ecological monitoring application of underwater legged robots. His research interests are related to the development and control of bioinspired robots for underwater operations, precision agriculture and biomedical applications.