Keynote speakers & sessions

Freshwater mussels are among the most imperiled faunal group in the world and essential to the functioning of many freshwater ecosystems. Freshwater mussels contribute to water purification through their filter-feeding activities, can strongly influence nutrient recycling and storage, and impact food webs through bottom-up provisioning. While the importance of mussels to freshwaters to ecological function is becoming increasingly understood, their linkage to human well-being is generally still overlooked. It is essential to understand how ecological and human well-being will be affected by declining mussel abundance and diversity and shifts in mussel community composition under global change. This session aims to critically evaluate the ecological functions and consequential ecosystem services provided by mussels by facilitating linkages among ecologists, social scientists, and economists.  

Land mollusc faunas have played an important role in the development and testing of theories of island biogeography, taking them far beyond the original, simple but heuristic model of MacArthur and Wilson. New approaches to systematics and phylogeny, primarily based on molecular taxonomy, and the use of increasing amounts of fossil records are enabling us to refine such models even further. Ecological constraints on the diversity and composition of island faunas are less well-known.  Given the disastrously high levels of human-induced extinction caused by invasive species and habitat destruction, integrating such constraints into our models has practical applications in conservation as well as in further increasing the explanatory power of our models. The session will offer opportunities to explore developments across these fields.

Aquatic habitats are difficult to sample, mainly because of depth, turbidity, current, navigation, drifting object,, and sometimes unfriendly creatures. Moreover, some aquatic organisms are difficult to identify in the field. This is particularly true for bivalves and Hydrobioids. Modern technics are being developed nowadays both for prospecting hard-to-reach environments and for securing species’ identifications. Environmental DNA (eDNA) analysis is one of the main promising technics for this purpose. Several approaches have been developed in recent years for a wide variety of essentially aquatic organisms. This session proposes to share experiences, both good and bad, on the development of eDNA and other innovative methods of investigation.

After the Industrial Revolution, the initial atmospheric CO2 concentrations of 280 ppm have increased up to the current 415 ppm, with an associated drop in ocean pH from approximately 8.2 to 8.1. Further increases are expected to happen, with CO2 concentrations of 760-900 ppm expected to be attained by the end of the century, with a simultaneous drop of 0.3-0.4 in pH by 2100. At the same time, it is expected that the average global sea surface temperatures will increase 0.3–4.8 °C by the end of the 21st century and the frequency/severity of extreme temperature events will increase over the next decades. Large-scale oxygen concentrations have also been decreasing worldwide at alarming rates, a process known as ocean deoxygenation. Concomitantly, the enhancement of contaminants’ toxicity to the marine biota and its potential negative effects on seafood safety is also a key aspect related to climate change. The understanding of interactive effects of multiple stressors is greatly needed, as the biological responses are frequently non-linear. In fact, such responses are highly dependent on the degree of increase (or decrease) and consistency of each environmental stressor, the phenotypical plasticity, and genetic potential of individuals, among many other factors. Under this context, here we will discuss how such interactive multi-stressor scenarios may elicit severe biochemical, physiological, and ecological challenges for marine and coastal molluscs in the ocean of tomorrow.

Freshwater molluscs are one of the most threatened faunal groups on the planet. Using examples from deserts to tropical forests (Europe, North Africa, and South-eastern Asia) we will discuss the scientific background, main threats and future challenges concerning the conservation of these animals and their ecosystems. Although the problems are distinct in the different continents main threats include loss and fragmentation of habitat, water abstraction, overexploitation, pollution, introduction of invasive species and climate change. Several examples will be given and their significance will be discussed. Special attention will be given to the impacts generated by invasive species. Finally, in situ and ex situ conservation initiatives devoted to the conservation of these animals will be discussed.

Because of the rapid decline of populations of freshwater mollusks around the world, one of the key areas of interest in conservation is the artificial rearing and propagation of endangered and key species. Coupled with other conservation initiatives, the propagation can tackle the decline and help restore the loss of ecosystem services. However, the propagation of freshwater mollusks requires the implementation of specific technologies and methods addressing different parts of the life cycle, that include the collection of larvae, the method of culture, the collection and rearing of juveniles, the selection of sites for the introduction and the mechanism to follow up populations after propagation. Different approaches to these problems have been used in the past around the globe with varying degrees of success, moreover, the propagation of endangered mollusks is still a growing field, with many applications and methods still being developed. In this talk we will take a journey through the science of freshwater mollusk propagation, describing the inherent complexities of their biology, the techniques used more widely, and the importance of such efforts for preserving mollusk biodiversity. These topics will be presented alongside real-life examples of propagation.

Over the past 250 years, taxonomy yielded ca. 76,000 validly named mollusk species. However, the actual number of species is estimated at ca. 200,000. Some scientists are deeply concerned that many species will disappear before being named. Yet, the number of taxonomists is surprisingly small for most mollusk groups, and thorough species delimitation is often time-consuming and costly. However, it is not straightforward to significantly reduce the share of undescribed species and increase the accuracy of species identification, because there is an inherent conflict between two main interests of taxonomy – quality and speed of species delimitation. In this session, we will, therefore, discuss exciting new developments in species identification and delimitation, including cyber specimens, niche modeling, innovative genetic, genomic and proteomic approaches, 2D and 3D morphometrics, machine-learning aided species identification and automated species discovery systems.