Jeremy Jenrette

The capacity to monitor shark biodiversity is vital for conservation. Baited Remote Underwater Video Systems (BRUVS) are an increasingly popular and cost-effective method to characterize their biodiversity, abundance, and distribution. However, BRUV monitoring remains hindered by extensive manual video annotation and a lack of accessible tools to generate datasets for ecological analysis.To overcome these barriers, we developed a suite of automatic tools for shark detection and taxonomic classification. We integrated an object detection model (SharkTrack) with hierarchical species classification (Shark Detector) trained on 264,712 images of 309 shark species, in two open platforms—an R package (sharkDetectoR) and a lightweight desktop application (SharkByte)—making the updated model package an accessible tool across computational environments and user expertise.Tested on 46,332 holdout images and 13.9 hours of BRUV footage from the Main Hawaiian Islands and Palau, these tools achieved 92% species-level accuracy as well as 94.7% detection accuracy, and reduced annotation time by up to 90%.These findings underscore the value of combining scalable artificial intelligence to advance shark biodiversity monitoring. By substantially reducing manual annotation demands while maintaining high detection and classification performance, this framework offers a practical solution to speed up BRUV post-processing and filtering of digital observations. At the same time, it demonstrates automated methods as crucial tools for conservation and management, especially to address species-specific data deficiencies in shark research.

Highly migratory sharks such as the shortfin mako ( Isurus oxyrinchus ) undertake extensive oceanic movements that cross ecological and political boundaries. This wide‐ranging behavior increases their exposure to human impacts, primarily from fishing activities, as the species is frequently caught as bycatch in longline fisheries. Consequently, the shortfin mako is listed as Endangered globally and Critically Endangered in the Mediterranean Sea. Despite growing conservation concerns, knowledge of its population structure within the Mediterranean, and its genetic and ecological connectivity with the Atlantic Ocean, remains limited, hindering the development of effective management measures. We investigated the population structure and demographic history of shortfin mako across the Eastern Atlantic Ocean and Mediterranean Sea using double‐digest restriction‐site associated DNA (ddRADseq) sequencing on 66 individuals collected from six regions in the two areas. After sequence filtering, we retained 4349 neutral SNPs to assess population structure and demography. Our results indicated a single, genetically mixed population across the Eastern Atlantic‐Mediterranean range, suggesting high connectivity and gene flow. Demographic analyses revealed a historically stable population size, although recent declines may not be detectable given the resolution of our genetic markers. While such connectivity may enhance resilience to localized pressures, it also implies that intense Mediterranean fishing could have population‐wide consequences. These findings challenge the assumption of strong genetic isolation between basins but do not preclude demographic differentiation. Given that ICCAT currently treats the Mediterranean as a separate, data‐poor stock, our results highlight the need for coordinated, basin‐wide monitoring and management to safeguard this endangered species.

Highly migratory sharks such as the shortfin mako ( Isurus oxyrinchus) undertake extensive oceanic movements that cross ecological and political boundaries. This wide-ranging behaviour increases their exposure to human impacts, primarily from fishing activities, as the species is frequently caught as bycatch in longline fisheries. Consequently, the shortfin mako is listed as Endangered globally and Critically Endangered in the Mediterranean Sea. Despite growing conservation concerns, knowledge of its population structure within the Mediterranean, and its genetic and ecological connectivity with the Atlantic Ocean, remains limited, hindering the development of effective management measures. We investigated the population structure and demographic history of shortfin mako across the Eastern Atlantic Ocean and Mediterranean Sea using double-digest restriction-site associated DNA (ddRADseq) sequencing on 66 individuals collected from six regions in the two areas. After sequence filtering, we retained 4349 neutral SNPs to assess population structure and demography. Our results indicated a single, genetically mixed population across the Eastern Atlantic-Mediterranean range, suggesting high connectivity and gene flow. Demographic analyses revealed a historically stable population size, although recent declines may not be detectable given the resolution of our genetic markers. While such connectivity may enhance resilience to localized pressures, it also implies that intense Mediterranean fishing could have population-wide consequences. These findings challenge the assumption of strong genetic isolation between basins but do not preclude demographic differentiation. Given that ICCAT currently treats the Mediterranean as a separate, data-poor stock, our results highlight the need for coordinated, basin-wide monitoring and management to safeguard this endangered species.