Biogenic habitats such as coral reefs, kelp forests, and seagrass beds, to name a few of the best known, play essential roles for the resilience of marine ecosystems. They act as refuges, feeding grounds, and nurseries for mobile marine species. For humans, they provide protection by attenuating waves, support livelihoods through ecosystem productivity and provide opportunities for recreation through the creation of seascapes. For these reasons, they are the target of long-term protection measures. However, the long-term maintenance of these habitats depends on physical and biological interactions whose effects have yet to be quantified in order to guide effective protection. On one hand, the stability of these habitats over time depends on the successful population renewal of living organisms and therefore the completion of their life cycle. However, most of the species that form these habitats have a life cycle with a dispersive larval phase that allows colonization and expansion of populations but may also hinder local maintenance. On the other hand, the concept of habitat formation for these species is based on environmental changes, primarily transport and physical mixing. An open question remains: what changes to the physical environment can we expect from a population based on its demographic status?
This session invites contributions that describe these two processes essential to the maintenance of biogenic habitats, connectivity and canopy cover, spanning spatial scales from local to the regional. We welcome studies from a variety of marine regions and disciplines, including numerical modelling, experimental studies and field measurements.