Elina Virtanen
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eavir.bsky.social
Elina Virtanen
@eavir.bsky.social
Marine scientist @syke.fi @helsinki.fi @nathist.bsky.social | #Conservation #MarineBiodiversity #MarineEcology #SpatialEcology #Sustainability 🌊🩵
Reposted by Elina Virtanen
new publication;
Particulate accumulated matter as an indicator of coastal benthic habitat condition

open access link; link.springer.com/article/10.1...
Particulate accumulated matter as an indicator of coastal benthic habitat condition - Ambio
Eutrophication adversely affects coastal areas, but most indicators of eutrophication demonstrate temporal or large-scale changes in eutrophication. These usually cannot be used in local actions, such as restoration or conservation. Eutrophication also results in increased accumulation of particulate matter and here we assess the usefulness of particulate accumulated matter (PAM) as an indicator for marine habitat condition in the northern Baltic Sea. We use > 50 000 observations of PAM, to spatially model the accumulation of PAM at shallow benthic substrates, and subsequently demonstrate the use of PAM as an indicator for benthic habitat quality. Predictions show only 4.8% of the shallow marine area as not affected by PAM and the abundance of PAM negatively affected the occurrence of Fucus habitats. Estimates of amount of PAM can be used for determining areas that will benefit from restoration and nutrient abatement actions and for locating the most pristine areas in need of conservation action.
link.springer.com
October 12, 2025 at 10:18 AM
Reposted by Elina Virtanen
My article is out! On how ‘ecosystem services’ went from a word for those aspects of nature that economics cannot express to a word for nature's economic value, and how concerns for planetary habitability disappeared from the environmentalist vocabulary.

www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/...
The Nature of Planetary Habitability: A Conceptual History of Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services | Environmental History
Abstract This essay traces the conceptual history of biodiversity and ecosystem services from the late 1970s to the early 2000s. In contrast to recent historical studies that have interpreted biodiver...
www.journals.uchicago.edu
March 13, 2025 at 2:05 PM
Reposted by Elina Virtanen
Our study comparing target-based and flexible ranking approaches used in conservation planning tools has been published

www.helsinki.fi/en/news/rese...
New study reveals major trade-offs in global nature conservation strategies | University of Helsinki
Recent research shows that conservation strategies aiming to protect as much habitat as possible can nearly double species protection compared to fixed-target approaches.
www.helsinki.fi
September 25, 2025 at 1:08 PM
Reposted by Elina Virtanen
Zonation 5 v2.4 is out now! This release includes fixes to a problem when using impact analysis with large rasters.

github.com/zonationteam...
Release Zonation 5 v2.4 · zonationteam/Zonation5
Fixes: when using impact analysis with large rasters, the accuracy of impact buffers could get low
github.com
September 18, 2025 at 3:06 PM
Reposted by Elina Virtanen
Need to do Zonation analyses in High Performance Computing (HPC) clusters, but previous Zonation 5 distributions were not applicable? The spatial prioritisation tool Zonation 5 is now available as an Apptainer definition file for Linux systems.
Definition file code for running Zonation 5 in Apptainer containers released | Conservation Biology Informatics | University of Helsinki
Need to do Zonation analyses in High Performance Computing (HPC) clusters, but previous Zonation 5 distributions were not applicable? The spatial prioritisation tool Zonation 5 is now available as an ...
www.helsinki.fi
August 6, 2025 at 12:25 PM
Reposted by Elina Virtanen
Please share: PhD scholarship opportunity in mathematical ecology on the value of information for improving ecological management, open to international students, with a great team @hugepossum.bsky.social, Katriona Shea, Kate Helmstedt, & me at UQ, Australia 🌍 🧮, study.uq.edu.au/study-option...
The value of information for ecological management
study.uq.edu.au
July 4, 2025 at 5:54 AM
Reposted by Elina Virtanen
📢A MegaMove milestone has just been published in @ScienceMagazine!
With ~380 collaborators from 50 countries, we mapped the movements of 12k+ marine megafauna to identify key habitats 🌊🐋🦈
@pewenvironment.bsky.social @uwaoceans.bsky.social
www.sequeiralab.com/news/megamov...
MegaMove uncovers where protection is needed for marine megafauna
A new Science paper maps global hotspots for marine megafauna & finds that planned increased protection will be insufficient to cover most areas
www.sequeiralab.com
June 6, 2025 at 1:40 AM
Reposted by Elina Virtanen
🧵New paper + open database drop!
The Marine Organismal Body Size ( #MOBS ) Database is now live—85,000+ marine species, from plankton to whales, with standardized size data.
A huge leap for biodiversity, conservation, and climate science. #science #marinelife onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...
MOBS 1.0: A Database of Interspecific Variation in Marine Organismal Body Sizes
Motivation Body size is a fundamental trait influencing an organism's life history, ecology, physiology and evolutionary dynamics. While extensive body-size databases exist for terrestrial vertebrat...
onlinelibrary.wiley.com
June 5, 2025 at 1:45 PM
Reposted by Elina Virtanen
Out today in Nature, our paper on the drivers of the record 2023 summer heating of the North Atlantic. Temperatures warmed to record levels in just a few months. The impacts on climate & ecosystems were severe. A thread on how this work came about and what we found.👇👇🧵 www.nature.com/articles/s41...
June 4, 2025 at 3:21 PM
Reposted by Elina Virtanen
Global change reshuffles species communities: who could interact with whom? We introduce new ways to measure the capacity of species & communities to rewire interactions, which can be used to predict how ecological networks might adapt to changing conditions.

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...
May 30, 2025 at 12:09 PM
Reposted by Elina Virtanen
New paper: Marine biodiversity is declining across Finnish coastal waters, with loss driven by eutrophication, climate change & seabed disturbance. Urgent action, better monitoring & bridging knowledge gaps are key to ecosystem recovery. #Biodiversity #BalticSea

link.springer.com/article/10.1...
Marine biodiversity loss in Finnish coastal waters: Evidence and implications for management - Ambio
Marine biodiversity loss poses significant ecological and socio-economic challenges. This paper examines how coastal biodiversity loss is expressed and outlines implications for management. Synthesizi...
link.springer.com
May 18, 2025 at 6:25 PM
Reposted by Elina Virtanen
🚨 NEW paper alert!
#Seagrass #functional #traits act as predictors of #biomass, albeit moderately. Study conducted across 1500 km coastline.
Main #biodiversity mechanism driving seagrass #biomass stock is through dominance.

@tvarminne.bsky.social @uwaoceans.bsky.social

doi.org/10.1111/1365...
Functional traits are moderate predictors of above‐ and below‐ground biomass in multispecies seagrass habitats
Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog.
doi.org
April 28, 2025 at 6:10 PM
Reposted by Elina Virtanen
Postdoctoral Researcher in Machine Learning for Nature Conservation:
jobs.helsinki.fi/job/Helsinki...

Doctoral Researcher in Interdisciplinary Environmental Sciences: jobs.helsinki.fi/job/Helsinki...

Deadline for applications: 15 May 2025.

@ediminin.bsky.social
@helsinki.fi #HELICSlab
Postdoctoral Researcher in Data Science for Nature Conservation
Postdoctoral Researcher in Data Science for Nature Conservation
jobs.helsinki.fi
April 11, 2025 at 5:32 AM
Reposted by Elina Virtanen
Apply for postdoctoral researcher and doctoral researcher positions at our department!

Postdoctoral Researcher in Machine Learning for Nature Conservation: jobs.helsinki.fi/job/Helsinki...

Deadline for applications: 15 May 2025.

@helsinki.fi @ediminin.bsky.social #HELICSlab
Postdoctoral Researcher in Data Science for Nature Conservation
Postdoctoral Researcher in Data Science for Nature Conservation
jobs.helsinki.fi
April 11, 2025 at 5:32 AM
Reposted by Elina Virtanen
Read our new review led by the fantastic Tin Buenafe on climate smart systematic conservation planning! A major contribution!
April 8, 2025 at 5:39 AM
Reposted by Elina Virtanen
it's a hard and sad time in science / higher ed in the US right now. on the other hand, lots of PhDs are looking for work, so I wanted to share—

I'm hiring a postdoc!

it's a two-year position at UCSC to do (preferably Bayesian) modeling of marine ecosystems: recruit.ucsc.edu/JPF01892
Postdoctoral Scholar in Quantitative Marine Ecology
University of California, Santa Cruz is hiring. Apply now!
recruit.ucsc.edu
April 7, 2025 at 7:58 PM
Reposted by Elina Virtanen
This paper - Quantifying disturbance effects on ecosystem services in a changing climate - was motivated by the need to anticipate and quantify how extreme events, which are accelerating with climate change, impact nature;s contributions to people, YET ... www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Quantifying disturbance effects on ecosystem services in a changing climate - Nature Ecology & Evolution
A generalizable, functional-trait-based approach for quantifying the effects of disturbances to ecosystem services and economic outcomes, including under climate change, highlights the need for incorp...
www.nature.com
March 5, 2025 at 3:15 PM
Our new paper on advances of conservation planning is now out! What a great team 🙌🏻 and thanks @sylvainegiakoumi.bsky.social for leading it! 🤩
New publication in TREE @cp-trendsecolevo.bsky.social
Given the political momentum for greater nature protection and restoration articulated in the targets of the Global Biodiversity Framework, we assessed the state-of-the-art of Systematic Conservation Planning. www.cell.com/trends/ecolo...
January 28, 2025 at 8:01 PM
Reposted by Elina Virtanen
New publication in TREE @cp-trendsecolevo.bsky.social
Given the political momentum for greater nature protection and restoration articulated in the targets of the Global Biodiversity Framework, we assessed the state-of-the-art of Systematic Conservation Planning. www.cell.com/trends/ecolo...
January 28, 2025 at 6:22 PM
Reposted by Elina Virtanen
Hallitus aikoo yhdistää riippumattomat tiedepaneelit - vastoin niiden omaa tahtoa.

Hiertääkö hallitusta se, että ilmasto- ja luontopaneelit ovat arvostelleet hallituksen toimia?

Riippumatonta asiantuntijatietoa päätöksenteon tukena pitää vahvistaa - ei heikentää.
HS:n tiedot | Hallitus aikoo lakkauttaa ilmastopaneelin ja vähentää uuden tiedon tuottamista
Hallitus aikoo mullistaa päätöksenteon tueksi tietoa kokoavat tiedepaneelit. Nykyisenlaiset ilmasto- ja luontopaneelit yhdistettäisiin yhteen ”jättipaneeliin”.
www.hs.fi
January 21, 2025 at 9:40 AM
Reposted by Elina Virtanen
New paper from me + @lauradee.bsky.social on using causal inference methods and concepts in ecology! onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/... (1/5)
January 21, 2025 at 6:00 PM
Reposted by Elina Virtanen
Small-scale fisheries account for 40% of global catch, providing 20% of micronutrient intakes for up to 2.3 billion people and livelihoods for 1 in 12 people.

Huge effort involving @fao.org & 800 experts, out now in @nature.com

www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Illuminating the multidimensional contributions of small-scale fisheries - Nature
A study aimed at revealing the role of small-scale fisheries in sustainable development shows they provide at least 40% of the global fishing catch and affect the livelihoods of 1 in 12 people in the ...
www.nature.com
January 15, 2025 at 6:50 PM
Reposted by Elina Virtanen
‘Bending the curve towards nature recovery: building on Georgina Mace's legacy for a biodiverse future’ - a special issue of Phil Trans R Soc B in honour of a very special biodiversity scientist - is published today by @royalsociety.org. royalsocietypublishing.org/toc/rstb/202...
Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences: Vol 380, No 1917
royalsocietypublishing.org
January 9, 2025 at 9:31 AM
Reposted by Elina Virtanen
📢#WeAreHiring! I am looking for a #postdoc (2yr position) either in ecological modelling or experimental trait-based ecology to join us in Northern Biodiversity and Ecosystem functioning group at @helsinkiuni.bsky.social

Thanks for reposting!
jobs.helsinki.fi/job/Helsinki...
Postdoctoral Researcher in Ecological Modelling or Trait-based Ecology
Postdoctoral Researcher in Ecological Modelling or Trait-based Ecology
jobs.helsinki.fi
December 5, 2024 at 6:26 AM
Reposted by Elina Virtanen
👉Open PhD position!
in pelagic biogeochemistry @tvarminne.bsky.social @helsinkiuni.bsky.social

Interested in investigating temporal and spatial variability in coastal sea-air GHG fluxes, impacts of heatwaves and links to biodiversity? Check this out!

Apply before 31 January
👉coastclim.org/news
December 4, 2024 at 8:04 AM