They have identified 15 threats that will have the greatest impact on environmental conservation by 2024

European press

La Jornada newspaper
Tuesday, December 19, 2023, p. 6

Madrid. Researchers have identified the 15 most pressing problems related to conservation, including invertebrate declines and changing marine ecosystems, as published in the journal Trends in evolution and ecology.

Since 2009, the Cambridge Conservation Initiative has coordinated the annual Horizon Survey, a well-established method of forecasting the threats, changes and technologies that will have the greatest impact on conservation over the following year. For the 15th edition, 31 scholars, professionals and policymakers created a list of 96 topics, which they eventually narrowed down to the 15 most innovative and influential topics.

Conclusions include topics related to sustainable energy, declining invertebrate populations, and changing marine ecosystems.

The 15 topics identified by the study include new sources of hydrogen for energy production, including seawater electrolysis; Production of decarbonized ammonia for fertilizers and fuels using fine water droplets, graphite and nitrogen networks, as well as food and feed manufacturing using fish-like feeders of autotrophic hydrogen-oxidizing bacteria.

In addition, they mentioned indoor cultivation in urban environments through artificial photosynthesis without light; Excessive use of rock dust to remineralize large amounts of carbon puts ecosystems at risk of heavy metal contamination or earthworm populations will continue to decline, especially in farmland and hardwood forest ecosystems, possibly due to pesticides.

Aerosols, harmful

They suggest that soil ecoacoustics, which produces sounds like water moving through it, can help control its environment and invertebrate populations; That forest fires can change weather patterns, e.g boy, By releasing trapped aerosols; Or that desktop DNA printers, capable of producing double-stranded DNA sequences on demand, are becoming increasingly advanced, widespread, and regulated.

The list also includes new ways to measure the toxicity of chemicals before harmful effects occur; Sustainable skyscrapers in Saudi Arabia will impact migratory birds, and sea urchins will continue to disappear rapidly around the world, perhaps due to protozoan pathogens that could threaten tropical ecosystems.

They conclude by noting that methods are being tested to remove carbon dioxide from the ocean, such as ocean fertilization, macroalgae and rock injection; Increasing temperatures in the aurora zone disrupt the ocean’s biological carbon pump and melting Antarctic ice alters deep ocean currents, reducing abyssal upwellings by 40 percent by 2050.

The problems identified in this exploration continue to reflect the intersection between human impacts on biodiversity and the increasing technological capacity to mitigate those impacts.wrote the researchers led by conservation scientist William Sutherland of the University of Cambridge (UK).

In some cases, new problems arise directly from efforts to alleviate other problems.And they confirm.

The authors identify several commonalities in their list of problems, including threats to marine ecosystems. They stress the importance of recent policy initiatives to help address this problem, while noting that these efforts will not help solve climate-related problems. Likewise, they analyze the importance that innovation continues to have in carbon capture and sustainable energy technologies.