title: Tropical marginal seas: priority regions for managing marine biodiversity and ecosystem function.
abstract: Tropical marginal seas (TMSs) are natural subregions of tropical oceans containing biodiverse ecosystems with conspicuous, valued, and vulnerable biodiversity assets. They are focal points for global marine conservation because they occur in regions where human populations are rapidly expanding. Our review of 11 TMSs focuses on three key ecosystems-coral reefs and emergent atolls, deep benthic systems, and pelagic biomes-and synthesizes, illustrates, and contrasts knowledge of biodiversity, ecosystem function, interaction between adjacent habitats, and anthropogenic pressures. TMSs vary in the extent that they have been subject to human influence-from the nearly pristine Coral Sea to the heavily exploited South China and Caribbean Seas-but we predict that they will all be similarly complex to manage because most span multiple national jurisdictions. We conclude that developing a structured process to identify ecologically and biologically significant areas that uses a set of globally agreed criteria is a tractable first step toward effective multinational and transboundary ecosystem management of TMSs.
authors.affiliation: Australian Institute of Marine Science, Townsville 4810, Australia; email: d.mckinnon@aims.gov.au *
authors.forename: A David
authors.initials: AD
authors.lastname: McKinnon
authors.forename: Alan
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Williams
authors.forename: Jock
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Young
authors.forename: Daniela
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Ceccarelli
authors.forename: Piers
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Dunstan
authors.forename: Robert J W
authors.initials: RJ
authors.lastname: Brewin
authors.forename: Reg
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Watson
authors.forename: Richard
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Brinkman
authors.forename: Mike
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Cappo
authors.forename: Samantha
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Duggan
authors.forename: Russell
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Kelley
authors.forename: Ken
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Ridgway
authors.forename: Dhugal
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Lindsay
authors.forename: Daniel
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Gledhill
authors.forename: Trevor
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Hutton
authors.forename: Anthony J
authors.initials: AJ
authors.lastname: Richardson
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D059001:Aquatic Organisms / Q000254:growth & development*; D044822:Biodiversity; D057894:Coral Reefs; D017753:Ecosystem; D006801:Humans; D014329:Tropical Climate