RESTORE4Cs Policy Briefs #6 and #7: Coastal Wetlands Indicators and Social Acceptability

RESTORE4Cs Policy Brief 6 (1)

The RESTORE4Cs project has published two more Policy Briefs that add to the 5 previously published by the consortium: https://www.restore4cs.eu/resources/policy-briefs/.

Policy Brief #6 “European Coastal Wetland Indicators: A proposal for monitoring policy processes across space and time”, offers a practical approach to track the status, trends, and policy performance of Europe’s coastal wetlands.

In fact, despite covering less than 0.6% of the European landscape, coastal wetlands provide important benefits to the environment, such as carbon storage, protection from storm, regulation of water flows. They also filter pollutants, and support a diversity of threatened species.

In order to protect and preserve wetlands, countries need to be able to monitor them through robust and harmonised indicators that track their extent, health, biodiversity, the progress of restorations, GHG emissions and removals, among others. The RESTORE4Cs approach integrates remote sensing, GIS, modelling, machine learning and in-situ monitoring to enable timely and high-quality assessment. You can read and download the full document: https://www.restore4cs.eu/restore4cs-6th-policy-brief

Policy Brief #7 “Social Acceptability: The Key Ingredient for Enhanced Coastal Wetland Restoration”, tackles the topic of social acceptability (the degree to which something reflects a community’s values, beliefs, and norms), and how this can “make or break” the success of wetland restoration across six European sites. Using a participatory, multi-criteria analysis, RESTORE4Cs researchers combined scientific assessments with local stakeholders’ perspectives.

They also analysed which key drivers play a bigger role in shaping acceptability: according to their findings, these are local economic interests, environmental benefits, and cultural values, while other aspects, such as trust, participation, and contextual knowledge, seem to be undervalued in decision-making.

Read and download the document here to get the key policy recommendations: https://www.restore4cs.eu/restore4cs-7th-policy-brief

WoRMS Top Ten Marine Species of 2025: nominations open!

WoRMS Top Ten Marine Species of 2025 (1)

WoRMS, the World Register of Marine Species, opens again the nominations for the Top Ten Marine Species of 2025, with the objective to highlight to the wider public the discovery of numerous new marine species made every year, and the crucial job of taxonomists.

In fact, the release of the list coincides with the World Taxonomist Appreciation Day, 19 March.

The 2024 edition winners spanned the tree of life, from worms to isopods to anglerfish (learn more here: https://www.marinespecies.org/worms-top-ten/2024).

This year, nominations will be collected via this online form: https://form.vliz.be/en/form/worms-top-ten-2025-nomination. In order to be eligible for nomination, the species must have been validly published in 2025, and must be marine, fossils included.

Nominations must include the PDF of the paper in which the species was described, and at least one good image of the species, including copyright and ownership information.

If you have a compelling story, a species with rare or unusual morphology, an interesting name, or that holds particular importance for various reasons (e.g., toxic, dangerous, medical, conservation target), don’t hesitate to submit your nomination by 25 January 2026!

You can find more details here: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/call-nominations-worms-top-ten-marine-trkwe/?trackingId=5CllFojTmxmjIRNMiXujgw%3D%3D

New paper analyses patterns and drivers of subterranean biodiversity hotspots

Subterranean biodiversity

LifeWatch Slovenia members Magdalena Nǎpǎruş-Aljančič and Tanja Pipan (Karst Research Institute – ZRC SAZU) co-authored a new, open-access article in BioScience, titled “Patterns and Drivers of Subterranean Biodiversity Hotspots across the Globe”.

The study maps global subterranean biodiversity hotspots, highlighting the exceptional richness of the Dinaric Karst. In fact, the extreme environment of caves hosts a surprising number of aquatic and terrestrial species that are highly specialised for these habitats: no eyes and pigments, elongated appendages, elaborate extraoptic sensory structures make these species unique in the world, and extremely rare.

Starting from recently published lists of such invertebrate and vertebrate cave-limited species, the researchers mapped hotspots of cave biodiversity – globally – to understand if any patterns emerge, and if these patterns may have any specific drivers.

These may include historical climate change, cave systems density, and resource availability, highlighting conservation challenges associated with protecting these ecosystems with unique characteristics.

The publication of this study was made possible by Prof. Emeritus David C. Culver, mentor of the paper, and a pioneer of speleobiology, whose work has shaped many studies and conservation actions of the subterranean life.

Read the full article here: https://doi.org/10.1093/biosci/biaf159

The BioScience journal, founded in 1964, collects timely and authoritative overviews of current research in biology, as well as essays and discussion sections on education, public policy, history, and the conceptual underpinnings of the biological sciences.

From science to society: Marine SABRES in Fairs lands in Pisa

Marine SABRES in Fairs at stakeholder meeting in Pisa - 14 January 2026

Marine SABRES in Fairs will make its next stop in Pisa on 14 January 2026, bringing the project’s results and resources to the University of Pisa.

The initiative aims to engage students, researchers, and citizens in exploring how Marine SABRES connects science, policy, and society to protect marine ecosystems and foster a sustainable blue economy.

The event will take place within the third round of stakeholder consultations, hosted by the Marine SABRES project and organised by HuFoSS (Hummel Foundation for Sustainable Solutions) and the University of Pisa. The meeting represents an important moment of dialogue with local actors and experts, aimed at testing and refining the tools co-designed within the project to support sustainable marine management and policy.

From 14:30, students, researchers and all those interested in the topic are invited to join the open session dedicated to the Tuscan Demonstration Area and discover our stand, including posters, thematic videos, the documentary trailer, brochures and best practices that have emerged from the Marine SABRES approach, with simple and replicable tools for administrations, operators and communities.

This will be an opportunity to learn more about the project’s activities, interact with experts, and discover how innovative tools developed within Marine SABRES can turn ideas into action for the marine environment.

🗓️ 14 January 2026 | 14:30
📍Polo San Rossore | Room SR D1 | Via Risorgimento 19 – Pisa

Meet us in Pisa and experience how science supports marine sustainability!

For more information about the project, please visit Marine SABRES official website: www.marinesabres.eu

How to turn data into impact: meet LifeWatch ERIC’s new CTO – Part two

Anne Fouilloux

In November 2025 LifeWatch ERIC welcomed its new Chief Technology Officer, Anne Fouilloux, to guide its technological strategy and ensure alignment with global advances in biodiversity and ecosystem research across Europe.

In this second part of our two-part interview, we asked her about her vision on how to turn data into impact, and how to break down silos and enable cross-discipline, cross-border collaboration.

If you missed it, you can read Part 1 here, where we focused on Anne’s experiences that shaped her work, real-life examples from her previous roles, and how these influence her approach as CTO.

Anne, you once mentioned on social media that we ‘turn data into impact for a better world’. How do you think we can achieve this?

“We strengthen the connections between research and real-world conservation through three key areas:

  • Making data trustworthy through provenance: At ECMWF, traceability built trust. Users could trace exactly which observations influenced forecasts. Biodiversity faces similar challenges with field observations, satellite imagery, eDNA, and citizen science. When conservation managers make decisions, they need confidence in their data’s origins and quality. A lot of very good work is done at LifeWatch ERIC on FAIR data management and we need to pursue this effort, not only for datasets but for our tools and workflows. FAIR Digital Objects is becoming increasingly mature and I believe it will help LifeWatch ERIC a lot in its operation. We are distributed by nature and we need to interoperate with others but also with ourselves.
  • Serving diverse communities effectively: Through Galaxy, Pangeo, and my current FAIR2Adapt project, I learned that accessible infrastructure matters as much as powerful infrastructure. We should strategically design systems that serve everyone, from citizen scientists to policymakers, with clear purposes and sustainable approaches. However, there is no single interface or tool that can fit everyone. We need to be able to build bespoke tools and interfaces in a streamlined manner.
  • Creating feedback loops: Real impact comes from connecting observation to understanding to action to learning. Can we trace conservation outcomes back to the research that enabled them? That continuous improvement cycle turns data into lasting impact for biodiversity and our planet. To get feedback, we need tools to measure, ask questions and collect answers in a way that is not disruptive to end-users. We cannot collect everything automatically but we should try to collect as much relevant information as possible, while preserving people’s privacy. We need to present transparently how we do and measure our progress and/or correct our mistakes.”

How does your mission evolve in the European Research Infrastructure landscape?

“European RIs work at a unique scale that opens exciting strategic opportunities.

  • From distributed to coordinated: LifeWatch ERIC’s federated nature across member states distributed geographically is a tremendous strength. It makes us more resilient, more fault tolerant and more importantly, we see the world from different angles and cultures. It can help us to increase the interoperability of our e-infrastructure. My experience with distributed governance, building frameworks that enable innovation while maintaining interoperability, helps harness this diversity. We can align technology efforts while respecting each center’s autonomy and expertise.
  • From independence to strategic partnership: My collaboration work with ELIXIR for leveraging their tooling and workflow tools, EGI for computing, and through EOSC shows how RIs complement each other. I want to help LifeWatch ERIC identify where we should lead, where we should partner, and where we should leverage others’ strengths, especially as we want to use and prepare for AI, quantum computing, and many other emerging technologies that will transform biodiversity research and increase data and compute sovereignty.
  • From operations to strategic impact: securing sustainable infrastructure funding and building capacity across member states ensures that expertise is distributed throughout our network. I’ve learned from organisations such as ECMWF, NeIC, and Sigma-2 how to plan next-generation infrastructure while maintaining current operations, and I’m excited to apply these lessons at LifeWatch ERIC. The ‘e-’ is clearly an advantage here, and we need to leverage it.
  • From capability to transformation: LifeWatch ERIC has impressive scientific foundations, strong ICT expertise and dedicated people across our member states. My goal is helping us work strategically together, maximising our collective impact for biodiversity conservation, climate adaptation, and the urgent environmental challenges ahead. The opportunity is clear: build on our strong foundation to create digitally integrated infrastructure that serves researchers, practitioners, and policymakers across Europe. I’m ready to take on this challenge and contribute to that mission.”

We thank again Anne Fouilloux for the insightful answers and we wish her the best of luck in her new role!

Tracking sharks in the North Sea

Tracking sharks

Researchers from the Flanders Marine Institute (VLIZ) and the Research Institute for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (ILVO) are tagging sharks in the Belgian part of the North Sea to gain insights on their habits. With the support of LifeWatch Belgium and the European Tracking Network (ETN), data gathered through this work might help guide targeted protection and management actions.

By implanting small acoustic transmitters into sharks, researchers are in fact able to track their movements across borders (read this article to see how ETN makes cross-borders science possible). Moreover, they use other techniques such as ultrasound, underwater video systems, and genetics to gain other insights on reproduction, diet, species distribution and more.

So far, they have tagged over 140 typical shark species of the North Sea, like the small-spotted catshark, the starry smooth-hound, and the majestic basking shark.

Despite being top predators, and despite their crucial role in keeping the ecosystem healthy, these species are highly vulnerable due to their slow growth and low reproductive rate. Monitoring them doesn’t only provide information about their health and habits: their presence is also an important indicator of good marine biodiversity in the area.

Read the full article on LifeWatch Belgium and find out the recents results of these studies: https://www.lifewatch.be/news/tracking-sharks-north-sea-better-protection-and-management

“Fish Don’t Know Borders”: how LifeWatch Belgium’s ETN connects research across Europe

ETN

LifeWatch Belgium connects researchers in the field of acoustic telemetry through a collaborative network called ETN (The European Tracking Network). ETN allows them to share the outputs of acoustic receivers and follow animal movements from the rivers to the seas, drawing important insights on how marine life links ecosystems in European waters.

This network, initially including just a few receivers along the Belgian coast, is now one of Europe’s largest monitoring systems, involving more than 600 European researchers who track fish and other aquatic species in order to study their migration, and their movement across borders.

Although the Permanent Belgian Acoustic Received Network receives signals from tagged freshwater, marine, and diadromous fish species in Belgian waters, it shares data through the ETN’s open platform to ensure they are available for researchers all over Europe.

In fact, during their lifespan, fish move between estuaries, coasts, and open seas, regardless of political borders set by humans! Shouldn’t science be able to cross those borders too?

Read the full article on LifeWatch Belgium: https://www.lifewatch.be/news/fish-dont-know-borders-tracking-aquatic-life-across-europe

Agroecology Partnership Meeting in Plasencia

Plasencia

On 11 November 2025, LifeWatch ERIC took part in the Meeting of Living Labs and Research Infrastructures in Agroecology, at the Centro de Agricultura Ecológica y de Montaña (CAEM–CICYTEX) in Plasencia (Spain), within the framework of the European Partnership for Agroecology (https://www.lifewatch.eu/agroecology-partnership).

The meeting gathered Spanish members of the Partnership to share the progress of ongoing activities, present new joiners and introducing work packages starting in the second phase.

It was also a chance to explore the ground for potential synergies and future collaboration opportunities. During the event, Iria Soto, Senior Scientific Manager at LifeWatch ERIC, facilitated the Working Table on Research Infrastructures and Links with Living Labs, together with José Manuel Ávila, Senior Scientific Manager at LifeWatch ERIC.

This session aimed to identify challenges, barriers, and opportunities in the interaction between Research Infrastructures and Living Labs, as well as to discuss tools and models for stronger, long-term connections beyond project-based collaborations.

The activity is part of a broader task, in which LifeWatch ERIC contributes to strengthening collaboration between scientific infrastructures and agroecological territories, leveraging its expertise in e-Science, FAIR data, and virtual research environments to support the transition toward more sustainable food systems.

The meeting also featured representatives from several institutions, including CSIC, AEI, CDTI, Junta de Extremadura, FUNDECYT-PCTEX, AGAPA, and the University of Córdoba, among other Spanish partners of the Partnership.

A conversation with Anne Fouilloux: meet LifeWatch ERIC’s new CTO

Anne Fouilloux CTO

November 2025 marks an important transition for LifeWatch ERIC, with the arrival of its new Chief Technology Officer, Anne Fouilloux. In this role, Anne will guide the development of LifeWatch ERIC’s technological strategy and strengthen the organisation’s capacity to serve the biodiversity and ecosystem research community across Europe.

We had the pleasure of sitting down with her for a conversation about her vision, and what she hopes to build together with our community. Anne brings over two decades of experience in Open Science, FAIR principles, and Research Infrastructures. She has dedicated her work to build seamless information flows connecting scientists, researchers, and technologists, working across academia, international organisations, and scientific collaborations in Norway, the UK, and France.

This two-part interview begins by focusing on Anne’s professional journey: the experiences that shaped her, real-life examples from her day-to-day work, and how this perspective will inform her approach as CTO.

Anne, what brought you to LifeWatch ERIC at this moment of your career? What made you feel that this was the right next step for you?

“The ‘e‘ in e-infrastructure, that digital ecosystem connecting people, data, and tools across borders, has always fascinated me. I first experienced its potential during the EOSC-Nordic project with the Nordic e-Infrastructure Collaboration, where we enabled ecologists to run complex Earth system models through user-friendly interfaces and automated workflows. Working across distributed networks showed me how combining different perspectives under a common mission achieves far greater impact than isolated efforts. LifeWatch ERIC’s distributed structure resonates deeply with my experience. The timing feels right because there’s tremendous opportunity ahead for LifeWatch ERIC. And on my side, after years supporting grassroots research community through initiatives like Pangeo big Data geoscience, and the Galaxy Project, I’m excited to contribute strategically to infrastructure with both the mandate and mission to maximise impact for biodiversity research across Europe.”

You bring over 25 years of experience in research software engineering, open science practices, knowledge transfer, and bridging gaps between science and industry. How will this background shape your approach at LifeWatch ERIC?

“I’ve learned that successful infrastructure requires understanding users deeply, enabling innovation through thoughtful governance, recognising the work done by the technical and scientific teams that support users, and critically, planning for both today and tomorrow. In e-infrastructure, this is amplified:

  • Balancing present and future is essential. At ECMWF, the system had to run operationally every six hours while also supporting cutting-edge research. This taught me you can’t just optimise for today or dream about tomorrow: you need both. You maximise what exists while preparing infrastructure and people for what’s coming. My priority is helping us make the best of our current resources while establishing a clear strategic roadmap. LifeWatch ERIC has valuable capabilities, from computational resources to tools to people. Strategic coordination helps us amplify these strengths.
  • Preparing users and staff is as important as preparing infrastructure. At ECMWF, we introduced an observational data governance that helped scientists integrate their research into operations smoothly. When leading the Nordic e-Infrastructure Collaboration for Earth System Tools (NICEST), we helped Nordic researchers prepare for next-generation computing. It’s never just about the technology: it’s about ensuring people can actually use it effectively and build on each other’s work.
  • Strategic collaboration multiplies impact. We can’t build everything ourselves, nor should we. My collaboration work with ELIXIR, EGI, Euro-BioImaging, and through EOSC taught me that smart collaboration with other Research Infrastructures lets us focus where we add unique value while leveraging others’ expertise for shared needs. This is particularly critical for LifeWatch ERIC in the context of EOSC nodes and in leveraging or preparing for technologies such as AI and quantum computing, as well as evolving cybersecurity challenges, where effective partnerships are indispensable.”.

Stay tuned for the second part of this interview! Anne will share her vision on how to turn data into impact, and how LifeWatch ERIC can contribute to breaking down silos and enable cross-discipline collaboration and synthetic knowledge.

Deep Learning and marine recovery: the DTO-BioFlow project releases new study

DTO BioFlow Press Release

What can 26 years of underwater video recordings tell us about climate change and human pressures on the sea?

Researchers from the University of Gothenburg’s Tjärnö Marine Laboratory have analysed footage from Sweden’s Kosterhavet National Park, the first marine national park in Sweden, to get a clearer understanding of the rapid transformations that marine ecosystems are undergoing. Spanning over 26 years, this analysis has great potential to show us how human and climate influence are literally reshaping the sea floor.

The study, published in the Ecology and Evolution journal, has been funded by the DTO-BioFlow project. DTO-BioFlow is a Horizon Europe Research and Innovation Action, that brings together 28 European partners to improve access to marine biodiversity data, apply artificial intelligence in ocean monitoring, and connect these resources to EMODnet and EDITO. As part of the project’s consortium, LifeWatch ERIC demonstrates with policy-relevant use cases the benefit of an end-to-end approach for biodiversity monitoring, as part of the project’s consortium.

This work offers a concrete illustration of how AI can contribute to ecosystem monitoring and management, by transforming “sleeping data” like archives of footage into ecological knowledge: it can tell us if protection measures are actually working, and show us the seabed’s responses to rising temperatures.

The results of the study showed that the restrictions introduced over the past 25 years in Sweden’s waters have contributed to the recovery of sensitive seabed communities, creating solid ground for the implementation of similar measures in other areas.

Read more on the DTO-BioFlow website: https://dto-bioflow.eu/news/using-deep-learning-unlock-decades-marine-biodiversity-data-and-plan-marine-recovering