Coastal and Benthic Ecology

Dear Colleagues,

UNESCO is proposing to assign the 2021–2030 decade to the promotion of Ocean Sciences for the advancement of Sustainable Development. This welcome development comes in the face of an increased momentum by government and industry alike to plumb our oceans to greater depths in the search for untapped blue potential, thus raising the bar in terms of potential impacts on the integrity of coastal and marine ecology. This calls for a renewed effort to embark on multi-disciplinary and innovative research pursuant to providing quantitative and operational monitoring data on the ecological impacts of anthropogenic activities being conducted within the coastal and marine domains.

Current human-mediated pressures on the ecology of nearshore waters transcend beyond the frequently-visited thematics of eutrophication, coastal urbanisation and coastal runoff and erosion, with more insidious pressures recently coming to the fore. These include the introduction of non-indigenous species (so-called ‘aliens’), including polyvectic and invasive ones, the proliferation of microplastics within coastal and benthic sediments, the heightened frequency of jellyfish blooming events and the propagation of shipping traffic-related impacts (e.g., underwater noise).

This Special Issue ‘Coastal and Benthic Ecology’ is being launched in order to spearhead a renewed research interest and undertaking in the:

1. The identification of novel human-mediated pressures and impacts on coastal and benthic biotic communities;
2. The development of novel monitoring tools and technologies to assess coastal and marine ecological impacts;
3. The design of innovative mitigation measures aimed at reducing the coastal and marine ecological impact of targeted human activities and
4. The formulation of concrete links between research outputs and deliverables for policy-makers within the coastal and marine impact assessment fields (e.g., policy briefs, recommendations)

by providing a platform for papers delving into these and closely-related thematics.

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Journal of Marine Science and Engineering is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• Coastal ecology
• Benthic ecology
• Blue potential
• Blue growth
• Environmental monitoring
• Ecological impact assessment
• MPAs
• Marine alien species
• Microplastics
• Jellyfish blooms
• Shipping traffic
• Ports, harbours
• Policy recommendations