Effects of climate change on marine biodiversity on the western Atlantic coast

The current climate crisis, driven by greenhouse gas emissions, threatens global biodiversity, including that in marine ecosystems. However, projections for the western Atlantic Ocean that jointly quantify species richness and endemism while accounting for spatially biased and incomplete occurrence data remain limited. We addressed this gap across the western Atlantic from 57°S to 40°N, within 1500 km of the coast and on the continental shelf in waters shallower than 150 m. Using broad taxonomic coverage across vertebrates, invertebrates, and algae, we modeled biodiversity metrics directly as species richness and the corrected weighted endemism index (WEIc), applied uniform sampling from sampling effort (USSE) to minimize the effects of spatially biased and incomplete occurrence records on predictions, and tested multiple algorithms to project these metrics under Shared Socioeconomic Pathway (SSP) scenarios SSP2-4.5 and SSP5-8.5 for 2050 and 2100. The results indicated a significant reduction in species richness and endemism, with up to 69% of the study area projected to experience a reduction of more than 5% in species richness under the high-emissions scenarios. The most affected areas included the coast of Florida, the Gulf of Mexico, the Caribbean, the northern region of South America, and southern Brazil. The decrease in endemism was equally concerning, with significant reductions predicted in areas of high diversity, threatening species adapted to specific ecological niches and increasing the risk of local extinctions. Vertebrates and invertebrates showed the greatest reductions in richness in the Gulf of Mexico, the Caribbean, northeastern Brazil, and northern Argentina. For algae, the most significant decreases were predicted for Florida and southern Brazil. This loss of biodiversity could compromise the resilience of marine ecosystems and the availability of fishery resources, highlighting the urgent need for coordinated global actions.

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Publication Details

Journal
Conservation Biology
Published
2026-10-14
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1111/cobi.70399
Primary Topic
Marine Biology and Ecology Research
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
0.00

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article

Effects of climate change on marine biodiversity on the western Atlantic coast

Gabriela Moura de Oliveira, Ubirajara Oliveira, Rosana Moreira da Rocha, Karla Paresque et al.
Conservation Biology
Marine Biology and Ecology Research
article

Effects of climate change on marine biodiversity on the western Atlantic coast

Gabriela Moura de Oliveira, Ubirajara Oliveira, Rosana Moreira da Rocha, Karla Paresque, Pedro Henrique Braga Clerier, Leandro Manzoni Vieira, Sula Salaní, Joel Campos De‐Paula, Paulo Roberto Pagliosa, Micaele Niobe Martins Cardoso, Sérgio N. Stampar, João Luís Carraro, Dafinny Rezende, Thaís Pires Miranda, Juliana Magalhães de Araújo, Eduardo Hajdu, Juliana Bahia, Rafael Bendayan de Moura, ANA C.S. ALMEIDA, Luciano Neves dos Santos, Raquel A. F. Neves, António Carlos Marques, André R. Senna, Virág Venekey, João Gabriel Doria, Erick Alves Pereira Lopes‐Filho, Lucília S. Miranda, Luanny Martins Fernandes, Rafael R. Fortes, Alan Dias, Fernanda Azevedo, Ulisses S. Pinheiro, Fábio Bettini Pitombo, Michelle Klautau
article en

Abstract

The current climate crisis, driven by greenhouse gas emissions, threatens global biodiversity, including that in marine ecosystems. However, projections for the western Atlantic Ocean that jointly quantify species richness and endemism while accounting for spatially biased and incomplete occurrence data remain limited. We addressed this gap across the western Atlantic from 57°S to 40°N, within 1500 km of the coast and on the continental shelf in waters shallower than 150 m. Using broad taxonomic coverage across vertebrates, invertebrates, and algae, we modeled biodiversity metrics directly as species richness and the corrected weighted endemism index (WEIc), applied uniform sampling from sampling effort (USSE) to minimize the effects of spatially biased and incomplete occurrence records on predictions, and tested multiple algorithms to project these metrics under Shared Socioeconomic Pathway (SSP) scenarios SSP2-4.5 and SSP5-8.5 for 2050 and 2100. The results indicated a significant reduction in species richness and endemism, with up to 69% of the study area projected to experience a reduction of more than 5% in species richness under the high-emissions scenarios. The most affected areas included the coast of Florida, the Gulf of Mexico, the Caribbean, the northern region of South America, and southern Brazil. The decrease in endemism was equally concerning, with significant reductions predicted in areas of high diversity, threatening species adapted to specific ecological niches and increasing the risk of local extinctions. Vertebrates and invertebrates showed the greatest reductions in richness in the Gulf of Mexico, the Caribbean, northeastern Brazil, and northern Argentina. For algae, the most significant decreases were predicted for Florida and southern Brazil. This loss of biodiversity could compromise the resilience of marine ecosystems and the availability of fishery resources, highlighting the urgent need for coordinated global actions.

Conservation Biology
Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais (BR), Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro (BR), Universidade Federal da Bahia (BR), Universidade Estadual de Londrina (BR), Universidade de Brasília (BR), Universidade Federal Fluminense (BR), Universidade de São Paulo (BR), Universidade Federal do Ceará (BR), Universidade Federal de Pernambuco (BR), Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (BR), Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina (BR), Instituto Nacional de Tecnologia (BR), Bavarian State Collection of Zoology (DE), Bavarian Natural History Collections (DE), Universidade Federal do Paraná (BR), Universidade Federal do Pará (BR), Universidade Federal de Alagoas (BR), Universidade Federal do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (BR), Universidade Estadual Paulista (Unesp) (BR)
Fundação Grupo Boticário de Proteção à Natureza, Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo, Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior, Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico
Life below water, Climate action, Life on land
Openalex Percentile: Top 17%
Marine Biology and Ecology Research
DOIOpen Access PDFOpenAlex
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