Master 2 Internship

Marine environments are undergoing rapid transformation as a result of increasing human activities and the development of offshore infrastructures. Understanding the mechanisms that govern the colonisation of new habitats by marine organisms has therefore become a major challenge in marine ecology.

In most teleost fishes, larvae initially disperse offshore before returning towards coastal environments to settle in habitats suitable for their growth as juveniles. The increasing deployment of artificial structures at sea, particularly in the context of marine renewable energy development, is creating new habitats that can be colonised by recruiting larval fishes.

However, the cues involved in the settlement of larval fishes within these habitats remain poorly understood, despite their potentially important role in shaping these novel marine ecosystems. Among the environmental cues that may guide fishes during settlement, chemical cues are particularly relevant because they can potentially be detected over relatively long distances.

Submerged structures are rapidly colonised by biofouling communities, comprising the macro- and microorganisms growing on immerged surfaces. These biological communities release a wide range of chemical compounds into the surrounding environment. This internship will investigate the hypothesis that some compounds produced by biofouling communities – particularly molecules involved in microbial chemical communication – may act as cues influencing the settlement of larval fishes around both coastal and artificial habitats.