Biodiversity stories

Studying bees and their behaviors, considering the important impact they have on ecosystems and consequently also on humans, is a fundamental prerogative to overcome the difficulties we will face in the future. For this reason, researchers from the Universities of Florence and Pisa conducted a study on theisland of Giannutri to understand what happens between honey bees and other bee species when they find themselves confined to an area with scarce resources. The research, titled “Island-wide removal of honeybees reveals exploitative trophic competition with strongly declining wild bee populations,” was funded with funds from the Ministry of Environment and Energy Security, the National Operational Program (NOP) of the Ministry of University and Research, and the National Biodiversity Future Center (funded by the European Union under the #NextGenerationEU – PNRR program).

Imagine entering a forest or prairie and observing seemingly lush vegetation. Yet beneath that green surface lies an invisible but significant absence: many species that should be there are simply no longer there. This is the notion of “dark diversity” (dark diversity): that is, all those species that would be ecologically suitable to live in a given environment, but turn out to be absent. The concept, introduced by Pärtel, Szava-Kovats and Zobel in 2011, makes it possible to measure not only how much biodiversity is present in a place (alpha diversity), but also how much is missing, while theoretically compatible with that environment.

Protecting the environment can lead to concrete and significant results: this is demonstrated by the unexpected discovery at Milan’s North Park of a small arboreal rodent, the dormouse (Muscardinus avellanarius). The discovery was made by researchers from the Biodiversity Conservation Laboratory at the University of Milan-Bicocca, led by Olivia Dondina, an NBFC researcher specializing in the protection and restoration of biodiversity in urban areas.

When it comes to ocean acidification-that is, the process of continual change in ocean chemistry due to the absorption of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, a phenomenon that can lead to a loss of biodiversity-sponges are usually considered “winners”: they tolerate a wide range of stressful environmental conditions, and they possess a siliceous, not calcareous, skeleton, which makes them less susceptible than corals and mollusks to ongoing changes. But not all sponges react the same way.

In playful interactions, the open-mouthed facial expression of bottlenose dolphins(Tursiops truncatus) corresponds to laughter. This is the finding of research in which the universities of Pisa and Turin participated, conducted using an observational approach on captive specimens.

The study of Tethys, the very ancient ocean arm that separated North Africa from Europe and Asia between the Permian and Miocene, is extremely difficult: it is usually covered by sediment. However, there are unique geological windows, where rocks usually located more than 20 km deep rise to the seafloor, crossing lithospheric faults responsible for some of the most devastating earthquakes and tsunamis in the history of Italy and Europe.

One species declines, another increases, and mountain ecosystems are paying the price. According to a recent study by the University of Rome La Sapienza, published in PNAS, high-altitude declines in tachinid flies, attributable to climate change, may reshape mountain ecosystems.

Longevity and health are worthy goals that are under constant investigation, and mapping the genome of the Greenland shark-the longest-lived vertebrate on the planet, with an estimated lifespan of about 400 years-may be a step toward unlocking its secrets.

A paradigm shift in the study of living organisms. This is what was proposed in a study just published in Science by theHolobiont Biology Network, an international consortium that includes researchers from numerous institutions including the University of Padua, Penn State University, the University of Copenhagen, NTNU University Museum, the University of Pittsburgh and the National University of Colombia.

An unprecedented map. This is the result of a study published in Nature and carried out by an international research team-including the Institute of Marine Science (ISMAR) in Lerici-that has found a way to use satellite imagery to map marine litter pollution in the Mediterranean Sea.