Biodiversité

COMMUNIQUE DE PRESSE - L’application de sciences participatives DRYRivERS montre déjà des premiers résultats ! Déployée à l’échelle internationale en 2022, elle enregistre en 1 an plus de 4000 contributions. Un ensemble de données en open-source, accessibles à tous via un simple site web. Un démarrage encourageant pour la préservation et la gestion de nos rivières, à l’échelle du globe.

In the French West Indies, more than 20 species of cetaceans have been observed over the last decades. The recognition of this hot spot of biodiversity of marine mammals observed in the French Exclusive Economic Zone of the West Indies motivated the French government to create in 2010 a marine protected area (MPA) dedicated to the conservation of marine mammals: the Agoa sanctuary. Threats that cetacean populations face are multiple but well-documented. Cetacean conservation can only be achieved if relevant and reliable data are available, starting by occurrence data. 

So-called “big-data” approaches have revolutionized fields of research from astronomy to genetics. Such approaches are not limited to fields that seem inherently technical, because the combination of rapid data collection and advanced analytical techniques could be applied to almost any scientific question. Nathan et al. reviewed how these modern approaches are being applied to the very old field of animal tracking and monitoring. Large-scale data collection can reveal details about how animals use their environment and interact with each other that were impossible to explore previously.