Project description
Understanding fish behaviour in marine protected areas
Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) are designed to safeguard ecosystems threatened by fishing, but their effectiveness in addressing climate change remains unclear. Many existing models overlook how species change their behaviour in response to protection. Supported by the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions programme, the PETRIFY project will investigate the ecological effects of no-take MPAs on fish populations through fieldwork, laboratory analysis, and ecosystem modelling. Focusing on the Mediterranean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean, the project will examine how protection influences fish behaviour using the ‘landscapes of fear’ concept and develop a new modelling framework to capture dietary flexibility within MPAs. These insights will help guide more sustainable marine conservation strategies.
Objective
"Fishing is one of the greatest threats to marine ecosystems, especially in coastal areas, where its impacts, combined with other human activities profoundly alter ecosystem dynamics. Moreover, climate warming exacerbates these effects and poses additional stress that will increase in the following years. Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) have been established to mitigate these impacts and promote ecosystem resilience by safeguarding specific regions, yet their capacity to buffer the effects of climate warming remains uncertain. While Marine Ecosystem Models (MEMs) are frequently employed to assess the impacts of MPAs under various climate change and fishing scenarios, they rarely account for the behavioral responses of species to protection, which remains a critical scientific gap. This project aims to address this question by investigating the trophic ecological effects of no-take MPAs on fish populations using an interdisciplinary approach that combines fieldwork, laboratory analyses, and advanced ecosystem modeling. A key focus will be on understanding how protection influences fish behavior through the concept of ""landscapes of fear,"" where predation risk alters prey behavior and trophic interactions. Additionally, the project will develop a novel modeling framework to accommodate dietary flexibility within MPAs, allowing for more accurate projections of biomass trends under various climate change and fishing scenarios. By exploring these dynamics in both the Mediterranean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean, the research will offer critical insights into how MPAs can mitigate the effects of climate change and enhance ecosystem resilience. Hosted by the Institute of Marine Sciences (ICM-CSIC) and in collaboration with AZTI-BRTA, this project will contribute valuable knowledge to inform sustainable management strategies for marine conservation."
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
- agricultural sciences agriculture, forestry, and fisheries fisheries
- natural sciences biological sciences biological behavioural sciences ethology biological interactions
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Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
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HORIZON.1.2 - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA)
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Topic(s)
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Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Funding Scheme
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
HORIZON-TMA-MSCA-PF-EF - HORIZON TMA MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
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Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
(opens in new window) HORIZON-MSCA-2024-PF-01
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Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.
28006 Madrid
Spain
The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.