Event Abstract Back to Event Marine resilience distribution in the Alboran Sea ecoregion Jose A. Sanabria1*, Natalí D. Lazzari1, María Rodríguez González1 and Mikel A. Becerro1 1 Spanish Scientific Research Council, Natural Products and Agrobiology Institute, Spain The Alboran Sea is an ecoregion in between the South European Atlantic Shelf and the Western Mediterranean ecoregions. Oceanographic conditions in the Alboran Sea are strongly influenced by Atlantic and Mediterranean currents, which suggest that this particular ecoregion could function as a transition zone from Atlantic to Mediterranean biodiversity. The Alboran Sea ecoregion is a major contributor to species richness of temperate seas and it is consider a biodiversity hotspot, but we know very little about the resistance and resilience of this region, i.e., the capacity of the region to resist to and recover from disturbance. Both resistance and resilience are critical components for a healthy ocean and a warranty to ensure effective conservation. Our study used a resilience framework to calculate an index based on a number of indicators that are known to directly affect the resilience of temperate benthic communities. Our results showed that marine resilience increased progressively and significantly from western to eastern Alboran Sea. Maximum resilience values occurred on marine protected areas. Whether the high resilience values of protected communities are a cause or a consequence of protection remains unclear, but our study supports the hypothesis that protection increases the capacity of the system to recover from disturbance and sets forth a number of hypotheses prone to experimental testing. Keywords: resilience, Alboran Sea, Marine diversity, protected areas, Rocky reef Conference: XIX Iberian Symposium on Marine Biology Studies, Porto, Portugal, 5 Sep - 9 Sep, 2016. Presentation Type: Poster Presentation Topic: 1. ECOLOGY, BIODIVERSITY AND VULNERABLE ECOSYSTEMS Citation: Sanabria JA, Lazzari ND, Rodríguez González M and Becerro MA (2016). Marine resilience distribution in the Alboran Sea ecoregion. Front. Mar. Sci. Conference Abstract: XIX Iberian Symposium on Marine Biology Studies. doi: 10.3389/conf.FMARS.2016.05.00156 Copyright: The abstracts in this collection have not been subject to any Frontiers peer review or checks, and are not endorsed by Frontiers. They are made available through the Frontiers publishing platform as a service to conference organizers and presenters. The copyright in the individual abstracts is owned by the author of each abstract or his/her employer unless otherwise stated. Each abstract, as well as the collection of abstracts, are published under a Creative Commons CC-BY 4.0 (attribution) licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) and may thus be reproduced, translated, adapted and be the subject of derivative works provided the authors and Frontiers are attributed. For Frontiers’ terms and conditions please see https://www.frontiersin.org/legal/terms-and-conditions. Received: 18 May 2016; Published Online: 03 Sep 2016. * Correspondence: Mr. Jose A Sanabria, Spanish Scientific Research Council, Natural Products and Agrobiology Institute, San Cristobal de La Laguna, Santa cruz de Tenerife, 38206, Spain, jose.sanabria@csic.es Login Required This action requires you to be registered with Frontiers and logged in. To register or login click here. Abstract Info Abstract The Authors in Frontiers Jose A Sanabria Natalí D Lazzari María Rodríguez González Mikel A Becerro Google Jose A Sanabria Natalí D Lazzari María Rodríguez González Mikel A Becerro Google Scholar Jose A Sanabria Natalí D Lazzari María Rodríguez González Mikel A Becerro PubMed Jose A Sanabria Natalí D Lazzari María Rodríguez González Mikel A Becerro Related Article in Frontiers Google Scholar PubMed Abstract Close Back to top Javascript is disabled. Please enable Javascript in your browser settings in order to see all the content on this page.