ABSTRACT: Climate change affects all ecosystems, but subterranean ecosystems are repeatedly neglected from political and public agendas. Cave habitats are home to unknown and endangered species, with low trait variability and intrinsic vulnerability to recover from human-induced disturbances. We studied the annual variability and cyclicity of temperatures in caves vis-à-vis surface in different climatic areas. ...
Climate change affects all ecosystems, but subterranean ecosystems are repeatedly neglected from political and public agendas. Cave habitats are home to unknown and endangered species, with low trait variability and intrinsic vulnerability to recover from human-induced disturbances. We studied the annual variability and cyclicity of temperatures in caves vis-à-vis surface in different climatic areas. We hypothe...
The 15th UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) (COP15) will be held in Kunming, China in October 2021. Historically, CBDs and other multilateral treaties have either alluded to or entirely overlooked the subterranean biome. A multilateral effort to robustly examine, monitor, and incorporate the subterranean biome into future conservation targets will enable the CBD to further improve the ecological effect...
Diplura is the sister group to insects and one of the three basal hexapod groups with unique entognathan mouthparts. The order is divided into 10 families, which include 1008 species in 141 genera, with a high proportion of monotypic genera. They are ubiquitous in soils and subsurface terrestrial habitats, as well as have an important role in overall biogeochemical cycles. We present the first comprehensive rev...
Campodeinae is the most diverse subfamily of Campodeidae diplurans and inhabits soils and subsurface ecosystems. These are distributed in the Palearctic area, clearly rarifying towards northern latitudes. The major taxonomic characters are chaetotaxy, shape and complexity of pretarsal structures, and secondary sexual characters. This monograph provides a taxonomic revision of the subfamily Campodeinae in the Eu...
Diplurans (Hexapoda) are considered the ‘ideal cavernicolous animal’ having one of the highest ratios of cave-adapted vs. non-cave-adapted species. They are successful colonizers of subterranean habitats, thriving in all cryptic, dark, terrestrial environments. Diplurans play an important role in the decomposition of organic matter below the ground and are sensitive to anthropogenic pressures. We present the fi...
Over the last 40 years, hypogenic karst/caves have become well known and hypogene speleogenesis has been used to explain the formation of some of the largest subterranean maze caves. These hypogenic systems involve confined aquifers with upwards flow, responsible for their karstification. Such spaces begun and could be remain isolated from the surface and the contiguous subterranean habitats, including the shal...
Subsurface biota extends over a wide variety of habitats that can be spatially interconnected. The largest communities of this subsurface biota inhabit cavities and are well known mainly in caves where biologists are able to have access. Data about deep subterranean communities and arthropods living under one thousand meters was unknown. An expedition to world’s deepest cave, Krubera-Voronja in Western Caucasus...
El primer Encuentro Ibérico de Biología Subterránea, celebrado en Valencia el pasado julio de 2009, logró reunir un nutrido elenco de investigadores y profesionales en diversos aspectos de la Biología Subterránea que trabajan en España y Portugal. Entre los objetivos del citado encuentro se pretendía publicar los resúmenes de las ponencias que abordaron la biodiversidad, distribución y aspectos de conservación ...