ABOUT BOOK

Larval dispersal is arguably the most important but least understood demographic process in the sea. ~The likelihood of a larva dispersing from its birthplace to successfully recruit in another location ~is the culmination of many intrinsic and extrinsic factors that operate in early life. Empirically ~estimating the resulting population connectivity has been immensely difficult because of the ~challenges of studying and quantifying dispersal in the sea. Consequently, most estimates are based ~on predictions from biophysical models. Although there is a long history of dispersal modelling, ~there has been no comprehensive review of this literature. We conducted a systematic quantitative ~review to address the following questions: (1) Is there any bias in the distribution of research effort ~based on geographical or taxonomic coverage? (2) Are hydrodynamic models resolving ocean ~circulation at spatial scales (resolution and extent) relevant to the dispersal process under study? ~(3) Where, when and how many particles are being tracked, and is this effort sufficient to capture ~the spatiotemporal variability in dispersal? (4) How is biological and/or behavioural complexity ~incorporated into Lagrangian particle tracking models. (i.e. are key attributes of the dispersal ~process well captured.)? Our review confirms strong taxonomic and geographic biases in published ~work to date. We found that computational ‘effort’ (i.e. model resolution and particle number) has ~not kept pace with dramatic increases in computer processor speed. We also identified a number of ~shortcomings in the incorporation of biology, and behaviour specifically into models. Collectively, ~these findings highlight some important gaps and key areas for improvement of biophysical models ~that aspire to inform larval dispersal processes. In particular, we suggest the need for greater ~emphasis on validation of model assumptions, as well as testing of dispersal predictions with ~empirically derived data.