2023 article
Editorial: Fish as sentinels of urbanization impacts in aquatic ecosystems
Rosso, J. J., Langerhans, R. B., & Avigliano, E. (2023, April 11). FRONTIERS IN ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE, Vol. 11.
author keywords: freshwater fishes; marine ecosystems; phenotypes; alien species; mangroves; habitat degradation; assemblage homogenisation; lamprey
TL;DR:
This topic Research Topic includes five key contributions examining changes in fish assemblages, populations and phenotypes, and their potential ecological, evolutionary and economic consequences caused by urban-induced changes.
(via Semantic Scholar)
www.frontiersin.org (publisher PDF)
UN Sustainable Development Goal Categories
11. Sustainable Cities and Communities
(OpenAlex)
15. Life on Land
(Web of Science)
Source: Web Of Science
Added: May 22, 2023
By 2030, urban areas are projected to house 60 per cent of people globally (United Nations, 2018). Cities tend to occur near water because of the fundamental need for freshwater, but also because of its diverse uses (travel, commerce, food production, power generation, flood management). In this context, urbanized landscapes represent a major threat to freshwater (Albert et al., 2020) and marine (Alter et al., 2020) organisms. Being one of the only vertebrates that inhabit all types of aquatic ecosystems, fish are good candidates to serve as sentinels of the impacts of urbanization. This topic Research Topic includes five key contributions examining changes in fish assemblages, populations and phenotypes, and their potential ecological, evolutionary and economic consequences caused by urban-induced changes. Major patterns in fish responses to urbanization may vary among species, type of aquatic ecosystems and biogeographic regions, and this was supported by the contributions of this topic including studies from diverse fish taxa, aquatic environments and regions around the world. Nearctic, Neotropical and Austral fish assemblages are covered as well as freshwater and marine ecosystems. The studies document important changes in fish facing urbanization at varying spatial and temporal scales. Temporal changes in taxonomic and functional diversity in the fish assemblage of an urban stream in Texas were assessed (Antoniazzi et al.) over a 30 year period (1989–1990 vs. 2018–2019). The occurrence of previously absent species resulted in increased functional diversity in the modern, more urbanized, time period. But certainly, these were not good news. The increase in functional diversity was supported by the addition of invasive generalist (e.g., blue tilapia) and native tolerant (e.g., redbreast sunfish, blacktail shiner) species. As these species were locally common in present-day assemblages, some sensitive sentinel species as Sabine shiner (Notropis sabinae) and blackspot shiner (N. atrocaudalis) were extirpated or drastically reduced responding to stream alterations. Moreover, all native invader species increased their abundance with urbanization. Indeed, worldwide freshwater fish homogenization is strongly determined by the species OPEN ACCESS