This campaign, the fifth worldwide after Svalbard, the Canary Islands, Guadeloupe and the Mediterranean Sea, is part of the DEEP LIFE project which, under the direction of the Sorbonne University in Paris, aims to map and understand the functioning of these habitats, from the poles to the tropics of the planet, to discover how they are reacting to climate change
In the first days of the research, which will mark a milestone in science by exploring little known areas of the oceans, but essential for understanding the connection between surface waters and the deep sea, it has been found that the vast majority of Roatan's marine forests grow on vertical walls, like real “hanging gardens” that extend between 40 and 120 metres deep
The Institute for Research in Sustainable Aquaculture and Marine Ecosystems (ECOAQUA) of the University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria (ULPGC), through the Biodiversity and Conservation Research group (BIOCON), has begun a new campaign in the vicinity of the island of Roatán, Honduras, to explore the deep sea forests that are being carried out in all the ocean basins of the world in the framework of the international project 'DEEP LIFE: Mesophotic Marine Animal Forest: Gone Before Known? '.
This project, which was presented in the Canary Islands on 17 November 2022 in the Assembly Hall of the Humanities Building of the ULPGC, brings together eminent explorers and scientists from 12 countries under the direction of the Sorbonne University of Paris (France) and has the participation, as a partner, of the ECOAQUA Institute of the ULPGC with the representation of the researcher Francisco Otero-Ferrer, PhD in Marine Sciences, professor of the Department of Biology of the academic institution of the capital, as well as member of the BIOCON research group of ECOAQUA.
The main objective of the DEEP LIFE project, which in Honduras begins its fifth research campaign after passing through the deep sea of Svalbard, the Canary Islands, Guadeloupe and the Mediterranean Sea, is to map and understand the functioning of deep sea forests, from the poles to the tropics of the planet, to discover how they are reacting to climate change.
In addition, its main task is to gather information to help regional and national governments define appropriate conservation strategies for these hitherto unknown places.
Specifically, DEEP LIFE focuses on unexplored marine forests formed by animals (corals, sponges, gorgonians, etc.) through multidisciplinary and innovative approaches to understand their biodiversity and functioning, with a special focus on mesophotic habitats (30-200m depth) in polar, temperate, subtropical and tropical areas, providing essential information for their protection and sustainable management.
Photo by @Alexandre Vigier - Under The Pole. Researcher Francisco Otero-Ferrer in the middle of exploring the areas for the development of scientific protocols.
Canary Islands expedition
The ECOAQUA Institute research team, which is already in the waters near the Honduran island of Roatan, is made up of the aforementioned Otero-Ferrer, as well as doctoral student Sandra Navarro Mayoral, joining the rest of the international expedition that will stay for about 3 months.
The members of ECOAQUA's BIOCON group will spend a total of 20 days carrying out different research tasks in this three-month campaign. Their scientific activity will focus on the characterisation of the biodiversity and biogeochemical processes associated with the marine animal forests under study.
Thus, this project, funded by the BNP Paribas Foundation, ‘will mark a milestone in science by exploring little-known areas of the oceans, but essential to understand the connection between surface waters and the deep sea,’ explains Francisco Otero Ferrer. In particular, the Roatán coral reef system is part of the Mesoamerican Barrier Reef System, the second largest coral reef in the world after Australia's Great Barrier Reef and one of the most visited tourist destinations in the Caribbean. ‘Currently, there is almost no data on the biodiversity and conservation status of the mesophotic zone of this reef, which suffers daily from the interaction of human activities,’ says Otero Ferrer.
Roatán's “hanging gardens”
After several days of exploration in the mesophotic zone, in search of suitable sites to develop the project's scientific protocols, ‘we have found that the vast majority of marine forests grow on vertical walls, extending like real “hanging gardens” that extend between 40 and 120 metres deep, the limit we have reached so far,’ says Otero-Ferrer.
This underwater landscape, with colonies of black coral more than 2 metres high, multicoloured gorgonians and sponges of infinite shapes that cover the seabed, "evokes in the ocean the legend of one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. In Roatán, we have been able to confirm its existence, revealing an ecosystem of extraordinary beauty and ecological value," the researcher points out.
However, he points out, "this verticality represents at the same time a technical and experimental challenge, in contrast to other regions where DEEP LIFE has carried out its activities. The steepness of the terrain makes it difficult to set up equipment and take samples, which adds an extra level of complexity to the scientific work.
The first experiments, aimed at assessing the biodiversity associated with these marine forests, will provide a better understanding of the ecological interactions occurring in these ecosystems and their role as a refuge, feeding ground and breeding area for numerous species.
‘The study of epifauna - small organisms that live on the surface of corals, gorgonians or algae - will help us to understand the role that these forests play in the balance of the marine ecosystem and how to design strategies that allow their conservation,’ explains researcher Sandra Navarro Mayoral, whose doctoral thesis focuses precisely on this field of study.
Photo by @Alexandre Vigier - Under The Pole. PhD student Sandra Navarro Mayoral, who is part of the ECOAQUA expedition, in research tasks.
Role of the Canary Islands
Furthermore, in the words of Otero-Ferrer, this project, which in its passage through the Canary Islands at the end of 2022, explored the deep marine forests of the islands of Lanzarote, Fuerteventura, Gran Canaria and El Hierro, in an expedition that had the main collaboration of the National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS - France), and an international consortium, ‘many of the results obtained could be applied to the management and conservation of these ecosystems in the Canary Islands Archipelago’.
For the ECOAQUA researcher, DEEP LIFE ‘combines the use of classical methodologies with other techniques such as acoustics or genetics (environmental DNA) to study biodiversity and the functioning of marine animal forests, as well as the importance of these ecosystems as carbon sinks, the threats and pressures to which these deep habitats are subjected and the different management and conservation methodologies to be applied in the future’.
In addition to the Sorbonne University (France) and the ECOAQUA institute, on behalf of the ULPGC, the project, funded with more than 700. 700,000, has the participation of the Centre de Recherches Insulaires et Observatoire de l'Environnement (Criobe, France), the École Pratique des Hautes Études de Perpignan (EPHE, France), the Instituto de Ciencias del Mar (CSIC, Barcelona, Spain), the Stazione Zoologica Anton Dhorn (SZN-Italy), the Centre de Formation et de Recherche sur l'Environnement Marin Université de Perpignan (CEFREM, France), the Universitá di Salento (Italy) and the Université Libre de Bruxelles (Belgium).