WILDLABS
World Wide Fund for Nature/ World Wildlife Fund (WWF)
The 35th annual European Cetacean Society Conference is taking place in Catania (Sicily Island, Italy) from 10-12 April, 2024. This conference is being organized by the Marecamp Association at the University of Catania and the Ciminiere of the Metropolitan City of Catania.
On 9 April, an all-day workshop on eDNA use in marine ecology is being held.
Workshop Description: The rapidly developing field of environmental DNA provides new capabilities that enhance and expand existing approaches to understanding species distributions, habitat use and trophic interactions. Such knowledge is central to understanding marine mammal exposure and vulnerability to human activities, and development of policy responses and conservation action. In this one-day workshop we will provide a forum for researchers to share the latest eDNA research that advances understanding of marine mammal ecology and monitoring capabilities, and to discuss protocols and best practice for the design and implementation of studies. We also want to facilitate networking opportunities and discussion of how a coordinated Europe-wide marine mammal eDNA monitoring network could be developed, including issues such as standards for molecular methods and data analysis pipelines, and the long-term research and policy needs of both researchers and end-users. The workshop will include sessions for invited/submitted presentations, round table discussions on methods and best practice, and breakout groups to discuss issues relating to developing marine mammal eDNA monitoring networks and policy needs, closing with a synthesis session to summarise all the work covered. There may be potential for the workshop synthesis to be written up as a review or perspective article, authored by workshop participants.
Organizer: Simon Goodman (School of Biology, University of Leeds, UK), Elena Valsecchi (Dept. Environmental & Earth Sciences, University of Milano-Bicocca), [email protected]
EARLY registration deadline: 23 February 2024
LATE registration deadline: 18 March 2024
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