ID: 613 / 51

Category: Symposia

Track: Pending

Proposed Symposium Title: SPEEDING UP CONSERVATION IN POORLY KNOWN ORGANISM GROUPS – NEW APPROACHES TO BRYOPHYTE CONSERVATION

Abstract: The earth is facing a major biodiversity crisis. Of the estimated nine million species of fungi, plants, and animals, about a million species are currently at risk of going extinct before the end of the century, while more than 80% of the estimated biodiversity still awaits to be described. Inconspicuous organisms are generally understudied compared to eye-catching species. They receive less attention in terms of funding, human resources, and public interest, though they are exposed to the same ongoing pressures such as land use change, habitat destruction and global warming. Bryophytes, of which around 20,000 species have been described globally, are small plants with unique life history traits. They play crucial roles for the function and stability of many ecosystems, especially in terms of water regulation and carbon sequestration. In this symposium we will invite speakers and welcome contributions to present state-of-the art approaches that can accelerate the documentation of bryophyte diversity on a range of scales, facilitate estimation of species extinction risks especially in poorly known regions and improve conservation. Examples of novel methods include simulations and modelling to predict extinction risk, remote sensing, trait analyses, ex-situ conservation, eDNA-analyses, metabarcoding, exploration of understudied regions, recognition of cryptic species, or citizen science. The talks will present cases where such approaches have been successfully applied to bryophytes, and/or they will showcase the potential of innovative approaches, for speeding up research, surveys and conservation of bryophyte diversity.

Speaker 1: Carlos Cerrejon Lozano, Institut de recherche sur les forêts, Université du Québec en Abitibi-Témiscamingue, Québec, J9X 5E4, Canada Carlos.CerrejonLozano@uqat.ca Remote sensing as an informative tool for cryptogam (bryophytes and lichens) research and conservation planning

Speaker 2: Fia Bengtsson, Norwegian Institute for Nature Research NINA, Trondheim, Norway fia.bengtsson@nina.no Using eDNA-techniques to accelerate bryophyte diversity surveys and to upscale bryophyte conservation

Speaker 3: Jennifer Rowntree, School of Biological and Marine Sciences, University of Plymouth, UK jennifer.rowntree@plymouth.ac.uk and Daniel Ballesteros, University of Valencia, Spain Daniel.Ballesteros@uv.es Cryopreservation of gametophytes as a tool for ex-situ species conservation

Topics (Up to three): Bryology

Topic 2: Conservation Biology

Topic 3: Global Change Ecology

Justification: We will present novel state-of-the art techniques to accelerate diversity research, surveys and conservation of speciose inconspicuous organisms that receive limited attention, focusing on bryophytes. The symposium bridges the topics 5, 7 and 16, and will likely touch the topics 3, 10, 14, 30 and 31. We prioritised early-career scientists when inviting speakers, covering research from different continents. We will keep gender balance and focus on understudied areas when selecting further contributions. We believe that the symposium will stimulate a upscaling of research on diversity and conservation of bryophyte and of other small species-rich and understudied organism groups.