[Dossier] Aix-Marseille University: a transversal approach to biodiversity (1/3)
Present during the World Conservation Congress organized by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature ICN from September 3 to 11, Aix-Marseille University pursues its mission in favor of biodiversity, making research advances available to the public. to preserve the environment. A presence that echoes a large-scale and multi-thematic action plan within our university.
Aix-Marseille University’s presence at the World Conservation Congress is a continuation of its commitment to sustainable development (see page 26) and has made it possible to promote a transversal approach to biodiversity. Thus AMU has highlighted the scientific advances of its researchers, like the Biodiv’Aquart project led by Thomas Changeux (MIO, attached to the Institute for Research for Development (IRD) and Aix-Marseille University), with fisheries historian Daniel Faget from UMR TELEMMe based at the Mediterranean House of Human Sciences (MMSH), AnneSophie Tribot (post-doctoral fellow) and Thomas Richard (doctoral student). Together, the four researchers were able to exhibit the results of their research and promote this multidisciplinary approach to biodiversity, called “historical ecology”. For Aix-Marseille University, the transversal approach to biodiversity is essential. This is why a project to create a research unit dedicated to the question is underway. “The issue of biodiversity and more broadly sustainable development concerns the whole young generation, whatever the discipline. This common thread of biodiversity is an interesting avenue for training, because it is the future ”, underlines Eric Berton, President of Aix-Marseille University.
Promote a participatory approach to biodiversity
As Mariane Domeizel, Deputy Vice-President for Sustainable Development at Aix-Marseille University, underlines, AMU also carried out a “cultural mediation” process with the general public during the Congress. Thus, the scientific approach of the AMU researchers mentioned above also aims to involve the public in research: via the Biodiv’Aquart site, everyone can thus create a painting that calls out to them at the turn of an exhibition so that they can be studied subsequently by the four researchers. A fun way to raise public awareness of biodiversity, while helping research to deepen its knowledge of.
Biodiv’Aquart: understanding marine biodiversity through art
“What if the tables could allow us to observe the evolution of marine biodiversity? It was while walking the corridors of the Louvre that the idea germinated in the mind of Thomas Changeux, hydrobiologist at the Institute for Research for Development (IRD) attached to the Mediterranean Institute of Oceanology. With the fisheries historian Daniel Faget of UMR TELEMMe based at the Mediterranean House of Human Sciences (MMSH), helped by several colleagues and students, they first carried out the statistical analysis of nearly 80 tables. dating from the period between the 16th and 18th centuries, and representing different “taxa” (grouping of species covering common characteristics). They were then joined by Anne-Sophie Tribot and Thomas Richard, respectively post-doctoral and doctoral student within the framework of the BiodivAquArt project for Aquatic Biodiversity in Art. We can illustrate their results from another work by Frans Snyders, “The fish market” (Hermitage Museum) where we find, next to common taxon such as carp, herring or cod, a porpoise and an otter which were more present and more consumed in the 16th century than in the 18th century. The process is complex: it is necessary to be able to distinguish in a table what testifies to an ecological situation, the potential offered by the techniques of capture and conservation / transport of the time, of a food preference or even simply of an aesthetic choice. It is therefore a question of having both historical and scientific knowledge of this period. “