Marine Conservation Institute

Towards understanding the benefits of shellfish aquaculture for U.S. coastal communities: Demographics, spatial concentration, and localness of leaseholders

Shellfish aquaculture in the U.S. is increasingly promoted as a climate-resilient, low-impact, and economically beneficial form of protein production that supports local and sustainable food systems. Yet, the development of marine resources can result in the marginalization of wo...

Det‐ LIME : Detector‐Aware, Multi‐Instance Local Interpretable Model‐Agnostic Explanations for Automated Marine Mammal Detection

ABSTRACT Despite the rapid uptake of black‐box object detectors in marine mammal research and monitoring, explainability techniques are rarely integrated into conservation workflows. Furthermore, most classification‐oriented explainability tools are ill‐suited to detection tasks...

Measurement and hydrodynamic modelling quantifies the mechanical cost of cyprid locomotion

Barnacle cyprids must locate a settlement site using finite lipid reserves acquired during earlier feeding stages, yet the mechanical cost of their locomotion remains uncertain. Previous estimates of cyprid swimming costs are limited and do not resolve how stroke-scale mechanics,...

Trophic downgrading in the city: urban structural simplification erodes the snake component of reptile assemblages

Abstract Urbanization is widely recognized as a major driver of biodiversity loss, yet its effects on the trophic structure of reptile communities remain poorly understood. This study re-analysed reptile presence–absence data from urban green-space fragments in Rome, Italy, to ex...