SEDIMENT SEAGRASS DIVERSITY IN THE MEDITERRANEAN BASIN IN A GLOBAL CHANGE SCENARIO: A MACHINE LEARNING APPROACH FROM SATELLITE IMAGES

The main challenge of this project is to correlate the changes in the sea surface temperature (SST) in the Mediterranean basin with the spatial distribution and size of different seagrass species. We aim to evaluate the changes in the biodiversity and the patterns they form to the SST variation and determine how the growth (mortality) rate depends on the temperature. The results derived from this project are expected to be of relevance not only to identify the vulnerability of these ecosystems to climate change, but also in the design of optimal restoration strategies that maximizes the restoration success while minimizing the time scale for recovery and planting effort. These objectives meet with those contained in the EU Regulation 2020/852 of the European Parliament that establishes the protection and recovery of the biodiversity and ecosystems and the support to environmental policies as one of the main objectives in the ecological transition.