Biodiversity changes in Arctic coastal ecosystems under borealization

Climate change is playing a major role in the current global biodiversity crisis. However, despite climate change being most pronounced in the Arctic, its impacts on biodiversity in this region remains largely unknown. Here, we combined three decades of abundance data from various animal groups (from zooplankton to megafauna) and regions in the European Arctic and Greenland to assess recent changes in biodiversity within Arctic coastal communities. Our results support the "borealization" hypothesis in all regions and provide evidence that marine ecosystems in the North Atlantic Arctic are shifting toward a boreal (i.e. cold temperate) state. Arctic endemic species are generally declining in abundance, while boreal species are increasing. These changes in abundance are associated with an average increase in biodiversity (e.g. species richness), although there are important variations among animal groups. This increase might be transient and the long-term implications of the ongoing changes in Arctic coastal biodiversity on ecosystem functioning and services remain uncertain.