This record provides an overview of the scope and research output of NESP Marine Biodiversity Hub Project D4 - "Expanding our spatial knowledge of marine biodiversity to support future best-practice reviews". For specific data outputs from this project, please see child records associated with this metadata.

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This project will fill data gaps and evaluate methods relevant to the ongoing spatial management of seafloor biota across the Australian marine domain. The objective is to prepare Australian, State and Territory governments for future best-practice reviews of Australia’s marine bioregionalisation that can be used to improve marine spatial planning and management initiatives (e.g. marine bioregional plan and marine protected area reviews, environmental impact and natural heritage assessments). The project will incorporate results from field trips to unexplored offshore areas of Australia’s marine domain and communicate biodiversity values of the AMP network to the Australian public.

Planned Outputs

• Report evaluating the usefulness of phylodiversity (genetic diversity) to spatial marine planning

• Report outlining extensions of known statistical approaches to be able to utilise available mixed-resolution biological data (including museum and historical data) for the production of best-evidence bioregional maps

• Report evaluating the usefulness of connectivity (current) models to spatial marine planning

• Report including description and images of deep-sea biological communities of the east coast, including the CMR network, on a scheduled November 2016 expedition of the NMF ‘Investigator’ (mid 2016-7). This survey will result in significant media opportunities to promote the values of the CMR network.

• Report including description and images of banks, seamounts and pelagic aggregations within the Cocos Keeling/Christmas Island territories. This would require a successful application for ship-time on the NMF ‘Investigator’

• Report investigating the possibility of downscaling biogeographic maps to the typical scale of areas of conservation concern (1-100 km) by utilising emerging fine-scale bathymetry (provided by the shelf mapping project), acoustic and water movement data