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Júlia Tovar Verba is PhD student of our research group at the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte. In her thesis she is integrating fishers’ knowledge and scientific information, as well as genetic analysis to build distribution and abundance models for marine fishes of economic interest for Brazil.  Currently, she is doing an internship the Conservation Genetics Lab, at Macquarie University (Australia) with Prof. Adam Stow. Her goal there is to apply Seascape Genetics analysis to identify important environmental drives for connectivity between populations of a snapper ( Lutjanus jocu ) and a parrotfish ( Sparisoma axillare ) in the entire Brazilian coast and between coastal and oceanic islands.  Júlia Tovar Verba This internship has been supported by the Endeavour Research Fellowships program of the Australian Government, National Geographic Society and CNPq. We will see soon new interesting results about here project, meanwhile… From: http://obiat.com.au/phd-thesis-wri...

During the last two years we have been working together with the Oceanica NGO and researchers of the Institut de recherche pour le développement (IRD, France) and Universidade Federal de Pernambuco (UFPE, Brasil), in a project funded by the Fundação Grupo Boticário . The project took place in Fernando de Noronha (FN) archipelago with the main goal of identifying vulnerable ecological areas for seabirds of FN, which is an oasis of marine life in relatively barren open ocean. Indeed among others remarkable biological features, FN accommodates the largest concentration of tropical seabirds to be found in the Western Atlantic Ocean. FN is protected by two different categories of protected area, according to the Brazilian legistlation: an APA (environmental protection area) covering mainly terrestrial ecosystems since 1986 and a marine national park, covering 112.7 km 2 of the archipelago, since 1988. Since 2001, the APA and the core and buffer area of the national park were listed as W...

Today we will talk about Natalia. Currently, she is doing a PhD thesis in Ecology at the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte. Her thesis associates habitat preferences, demography and molecular tools aiming to assess the vulnerability of the endemic and endangered Greenbeak parrotfish ( Scarus trispinosus ), with the goal of subsidizing actions for the species conservation. Last year she worked very hard to collect data...take a look! Aiming to investigate habitat preferences, underwater visual censuses were conducted along Rio Grande do Norte coast (Brazilian northeast) to collect density and biomass patterns of five endemic Brazilian parrotfish species.  Endemic Brazilian parrotfish individuals. The visual censuses consist of belt transects in which a diver identified, counted and estimated the total length of the parrotfish species inside an area of 40 m² (20 x 2 m).  Natalia during a visual census. Parrotfish biomass was estimated using length-weight relationshi...

More than 15,000 scientists from 184 countries have published a second warning to humanity advising that we need to change our wicked ways to help the planet.  Among them the FEME members signed this call. This new message is an update of the original warning sent from the Union of Concerned Scientists 25 years ago. But today the picture is far worse than it was in 1992. It's true that some progress had been made in some areas - such as cutting ozone-depleting chemicals, and increasing energy generated from renewable sources - but this was far outweighed by the damaging trends. In the past 25 years: The amount of fresh water available per head of population worldwide has reduced by 26%. The number of ocean "dead zones" - places where little can live because of pollution and oxygen starvation - has increased by 75%. Nearly 300 million acres of forest have been lost, mostly to make way for agricultural land. Global carbon emissions and average temperatures have shown contin...

A study conducted at the University of Lund (Sweden) revealed that plastic nanoparticles reduce the survival of zooplankton and penetrate the fish brain, causing behavioral disturbances. This pioneering study was published in the journal Scientific Reports, last month. The increase in the production of plastic material in the last decades around the world has turned plastic waste into a major problem in the oceans. About 60-80% of all marine litter is made out of plastic, affecting at least 660 marine species (the ones we know so far), showing that this material is a serious pollutant for aquatic environments. Through physical-chemical and biological reactions caused by environmental conditions, the plastic material is divided into smaller and smaller pieces, reaching the size of nanoparticles. Being so small is a dangerous characteristic because the plastic nanoparticles are able to overcome biological barriers, penetrating tissues and accumulating in organs, thus a...

In December 2015 we interviewed Mauro Ruffino . In this interview we asked his opinion about the extinction of the Ministry of Fisheries and Aquaculture (MPA) and its incorporation into the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Supply (MAPA), among other questions. At the time, he made it clear that the change was being made in a disorderly way, but that should not be a problem as long as MAPA gave aquaculture, artisanal fishing and industrial fishing the same treatment. Little did we know that that was only the beginning of a political saga involving Brazilian fisheries… The truth is that the story does not really begin in 2015. Since 2011 the institutional fishing sector has been quickly dismantled, probably with the support and applause of many that do not want to see sustainable fishery policies being properly implemented. Specifically, 2011 marks the end of national fisheries statistics and the beginning of an era of political instability. In 2015 we watched, s...

Does plastic around the world really get recycled? Not at all! Only 9% of discarded plastic is recycled. Plastic pollution is threatening the marine ecosystem worldwide. More than 8 billion tons of plastic are produced by humanity, and about 8 million tons are dumped into our oceans every year, where it persists for decades. Over the next years, the amount of marine plastic waste will double if we do not act. A global issue affects our ocean, our health, and our well-being. In fact, oceans host 80% of the planet’s biodiversity, they are the largest ecosystem on Earth, and are an import source of food. Despite the fact that researchers are uncertain about the nature and extent of the risk of marine debris on ecosystems and humans, the concern about plastic persistence and their effects on the oceans has increased since the last decade. Once in the ocean, the huge amount of plastic, although widespread, affects the safety of sea transport, fisheries, tourism, recreation, and biodiversity...