My name is Tal Gavriel. I’m a Ph.D. student at Tel Aviv University, School of Zoology, under the supervision of Prof. Yoni Belmaker.
In my research, I examine the effect of the Mediterranean Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) on the species’ diversity and especially what absent species can tell us about the effectiveness of MPAs in preserving biodiversity. Dark diversity is the species we expect to see in a given location but, for some reason, missing. Adding the dark diversity to species richness can be used to estimate the habitat potential to hold diversity. Thus, the dark diversity index can be harnessed to separate the effect of fishing protection from habitat quality when comparing MPAs to control sites and understand the true effect of MPAs.
I have a bachelor’s degree in marine science from Ruppin Academic Centre, and I did my master’s degree also at Tel Aviv University at the Belmaker lab, where I studied the behavior of lionfish in the Red Sea. I love being at sea, and I’m trying to be there as much as possible, either at work or in my free time.

Tal won our scholarship  for postgraduate students for her study of the Mediterranean Sea during 2023