Scientific dissemination in the Instituto Español de Oceanografía (IEO): Best practices in recent years

There is a growing interest and obligations to bring the results of scientific research closer to society. In this sense, the Instituto Español de Oceanografía (IEO, CSIC) has acquired in recent years an institutional commitment with the scientific dissemination, carrying out some projects on this topic. The objective of these projects is to visualize and value their research and results in different formats increasing the scientific culture of society that demand and financed most of public research. In the present work four successful initiatives or projects are presented. Diversimar project is a citizen science tool for the observation of the marine and fishing biodiversity of Galicia and the Cantabrian Sea. Mar interior project brings activity of IEO to society with face-to-face conferences and workshops. Planet Tuna project combines science with art through an online platform to enhance the scientific knowledge of tuna and other big pelagics for their sustainability. To end, the interactive book “45 days on the Flemish Cap Bank” spreads the technical and human effort of an oceanographic survey that remains behind the fisheries management developed by the IEO. The objective of the present study is to make visible and put in value these projects and serve as inspiration.Versión del edito

A survey of the European Reference Network EpiCARE on clinical practice for selected rare epilepsies

Objective: Clinical care of rare and complex epilepsies is challenging, because evidence-based treatment guidelines are scarce, the experience of many physicians is limited, and interdisciplinary treatment of comorbidities is required. The pathomechanisms of rare epilepsies are, however, increasingly understood, which potentially fosters novel targeted therapies. The objectives of our survey were to obtain an overview of the clinical practice in European tertiary epilepsy centers treating patients with 5 arbitrarily selected rare epilepsies and to get an estimate of potentially available patients for future studies. Methods: Members of the European Reference Network for rare and complex epilepsies (EpiCARE) were invited to participate in a web-based survey on clinical practice of patients with Dravet syndrome, tuberous sclerosis complex (TSC), autoimmune encephalitis, and progressive myoclonic epilepsies including Unverricht Lundborg and Unverricht-like diseases. A consensus-based questionnaire was generated for each disease. Results: Twenty-six of 30 invited epilepsy centers participated. Cohorts were present in most responding centers for TSC (87%), Dravet syndrome (85%), and autoimmune encephalitis (71%). Patients with TSC and Dravet syndrome represented the largest cohorts in these centers. The antiseizure drug treatments were rather consistent across the centers especially with regard to Dravet syndrome, infantile spasms in TSC, and Unverricht Lundborg / Unverricht-like disease. Available, widely used targeted therapies included everolimus in TSC and immunosuppressive therapies in autoimmune encephalitis. Screening for comorbidities was routinely done, but specific treatment protocols were lacking in most centers. Significance: The survey summarizes the current clinical practice for selected rare epilepsies in tertiary European epilepsy centers and demonstrates consistency as well as heterogeneity in the treatment, underscoring the need for controlled trials and recommendations. The survey also provides estimates for potential participants of clinical trials recruited via EpiCARE, emphasizing the great potential of Reference Networks for future studies to evaluate new targeted therapies and to identify novel biomarkers.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Atlas de las praderas marinas de España

Knowledge of the distribution and extent of seagrass habitats is currently the basis of management and conservation policies of the coastal zones in most European countries. This basic information is being requested through European directives for the establishment of monitoring programmes and the implementation of specific actions to preserve the marine environment. In addition, this information is crucial for the quantification of the ecological importance usually attributed to seagrass habitats due to, for instance, their involvement in biogeochemical cycles, marine biodiversity and quality of coastal waters or global carbon budgets. The seagrass atlas of Spain represents a huge collective effort performed by 84 authors across 30 Spanish institutions largely involved in the scientific research, management and conservation of seagrass habitats during the last three decades. They have contributed to the availability of the most precise and realistic seagrass maps for each region of the Spanish coast which have been integrated in a GIS to obtain the distribution and area of each seagrass species. Most of this information has independently originated at a regional level by regional governments, universities and public research organisations, which explain the elevated heterogeneity in criteria, scales, methods and objectives of the available information. On this basis, seagrass habitats in Spain occupy a total surface of 1,541,63 km2, 89% of which is concentrated in the Mediterranean regions; the rest is present in sheltered estuarine areas of the Atlantic peninsular regions and in the open coastal waters of the Canary Islands, which represents 50% of the Atlantic meadows. Of this surface, 71.5% corresponds to Posidonia oceanica, 19.5% to Cymodocea nodosa, 3.1% to Zostera noltii (=Nanozostera noltii), 0.3% to Zostera marina and 1.2% to Halophila decipiens. Species distribution maps are presented (including Ruppia spp.), together with maps of the main impacts and pressures that has affected or threatened their conservation status, as well as the management tools established for their protection and conservation. Despite this considerable effort, and the fact that Spain has mapped wide shelf areas, the information available is still incomplete and with weak precision in many regions, which will require an investment of major effort in the near future to complete the whole picture and respond to demands of EU directives.Versión del edito

Atlas de las praderas marinas de España

Knowledge of the distribution and extent of seagrass habitats is currently the basis of management and conservation policies of the coastal zones in most European countries. This basic information is being requested through European directives for the establishment of monitoring programmes and the implementation of specific actions to preserve the marine environment. In addition, this information is crucial for the quantification of the ecological importance usually attributed to seagrass habitats due to, for instance, their involvement in biogeochemical cycles, marine biodiversity and quality of coastal waters or global carbon budgets. The seagrass atlas of Spain represents a huge collective effort performed by 84 authors across 30 Spanish institutions largely involved in the scientific research, management and conservation of seagrass habitats during the last three decades. They have contributed to the availability of the most precise and realistic seagrass maps for each region of the Spanish coast which have been integrated in a GIS to obtain the distribution and area of each seagrass species. Most of this information has independently originated at a regional level by regional governments, universities and public research organisations, which explain the elevated heterogeneity in criteria, scales, methods and objectives of the available information. On this basis, seagrass habitats in Spain occupy a total surface of 1,541,63 km2, 89% of which is concentrated in the Mediterranean regions; the rest is present in sheltered estuarine areas of the Atlantic peninsular regions and in the open coastal waters of the Canary Islands, which represents 50% of the Atlantic meadows. Of this surface, 71.5% corresponds to Posidonia oceanica, 19.5% to Cymodocea nodosa, 3.1% to Zostera noltii (=Nanozostera noltii), 0.3% to Zostera marina and 1.2% to Halophila decipiens. Species distribution maps are presented (including Ruppia spp.), together with maps of the main impacts and pressures that has affected or threatened their conservation status, as well as the management tools established for their protection and conservation. Despite this considerable effort, and the fact that Spain has mapped wide shelf areas, the information available is still incomplete and with weak precision in many regions, which will require an investment of major effort in the near future to complete the whole picture and respond to demands of EU directives

Twitter data analysis to assess the interest of citizens on the impact of marine plastic pollution

Few studies have mined social media platforms to assess environmental concerns. In this study, Twitter was scraped to obtain a ~140,000 tweet dataset related specifically to marine plastic pollution. The goal is to understand what kind of users profiles are tweeting and how and when they do it. In addition, topic modelling and graph theory techniques have allowed us to identify main concerns on this topic: i) impact on wildlife, ii) microplastics/water pollution, iii) estimates/reports, iv) legislation/protection, and v) recycling/cleaning initiatives. Results reveal a scarce influence of organizations involved in research and marine environmental awareness, so some guidelines are depicted that could help to adjust their communication plans. This is relevant to engage society through reliable information, change habits and reinforce sustainable behaviour. A visualization tool has been created to analyze the results over time.This work was co-financed by both the European Regional Development Fund through the CleanAtlantic INTERREG (Atlantic Area) project [grant number EAPA_046/2016] and the Agencia Estatal de Investigación (Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación, Government of Spain) through ANDROMEDA project [grant number PCI2020-112047].En prensa2,35

Tweeting about marine plastic pollution: a oneyear exploratory data analysis

Twitter, with more than 330 million monthly active users worldwide, is an invaluable source for studying environmental and social concerns. Here, we present an exploratory data analysis of a one-year (July 20- July 21) dataset of ~132K tweets containing the words ‘plastic’ or ‘microplastic’ in reference to the marine environment. Understanding what kind of users profiles are tweeting and how and when they do it, could help organizations involved in research and marine environmental awareness to adjust their communication plans. A web app called Twilitter has been created to analyze these results over time

#PalabrasClave

Con motivo de la Semana de la ciencia 2020 se llevó a cabo una acción en redes sociales en la que mediante pequeños audios se difundió la labor investigadora del Centro Oceanográfico de Vigo y se mostró en qué medida contribuye a las metas de la Década de los Océanos; para ello se usaron diez conceptos científicos representativos, elegidos en colaboración con investigadores de todas las áreas del Centro. Los audios resultantes se difundieron en las redes sociales del Centro bajo el hastag #PalabrasClave, mostrando diariamente a lo largo de dos semanas un término científico acompañado de un audio corto en el que un investigador del IEO cuenta algún logro conseguido en su trabajo y relacionado con el término elegido, que a su vez está conectado con un reto para la Década de los Océanos