Marine Heatwaves Overwhelm the Buffering Benefits of Marine Protected Areas: Two Decades of Collapse in a Mediterranean Gorgonian.

ABSTRACT: Marine heatwaves (MHWs) are driving mass mortalities of coastal foundation species globally, threatening their persistence and the ecosystems they support. However, long-term demographic evidence of these impacts at regional scales is scarce. Accordingly, whether ongoing conservation actions, mainly marine protected areas (MPAs), mitigate the impact of MHWs is still an open question. Here, we address these gaps by analysing over two decades of demographic monitoring data from 49 shallow (< 40 m depth) populations of the foundation gorgonian Paramuricea clavata paired with in situ temperature records across the north-western Mediterranean (38°-43° N, 0°-8° E). Using hierarchical Bayesian models, we estimated regional-scale trends and assessed the combined influence of MHW exposure and prote

SUBMITTER: Zentner Y 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC13473729 | biostudies-literature | 2026 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature