Thermal anomalies across Ecuadorian Pacific waters continue to trigger profound disruptions in coastal oceanographic and biological dynamics. Against this backdrop, marine biologist and Faculty of Life Sciences (FLS-ESPOL) research professor Félix Morales, Ph.D., weighed in as a scientific expert to assess the ecological toll that El Niño exerts on marine populations.
The imminent arrival of the El Niño climate phenomenon places Ecuador's agricultural sector in a state of high structural vulnerability. Within this framework, projections from the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) warn that approximately 2.6 million people could face crisis and emergency phases of food insecurity between August and November 2026—even before factoring in the direct toll of the climatic event.
From August 24 to September 15, 2026, Raquel Ruiz Araujo, a graduate student in the Master’s Program in Applied Biosciences with a concentration in Biodiscovery at the Faculty of Life Sciences (FLS-ESPOL), completed a research internship at the School of Resource and Environmental Management (REM), within the Faculty of Environment at Simon Fraser University (SFU) in Burnaby, Canada.
On August 24, 2026, the Graduate Hall at the Faculty of Life Sciences (FLS) hosted a new edition of #5MinPitch, an initiative led by Valeria Guzmán that challenges senior-year students to concisely and rigorously present the outcomes of their capstone projects (materias integradoras) before a panel of expert evaluators.
The session commenced at 12:00 PM with welcoming remarks and an overview of the evaluation rubric, followed by technical pitches delivered by the graduating agricultural engineers:
Beyond the immediate mortality of seabirds observed along the nation's coastlines, the most critical and silent toll driven by El Niño conditions strikes marine wildlife reproductive cycles. Faced with the deepening of prey fish and the depletion of surface nutrients, adult birds endure negative energy balances that compromise colony viability.
Guayaquil encompasses at least six protected forests and hills—including Cerro Blanco, Cerro Colorado, and Cerro Paraíso—that function as urban green lungs and natural barriers against unplanned urban sprawl.
During his remarks, Julián Pérez Correa, specialist at FLS-ESPOL, emphasized the biological richness concentrated within these ecosystems:
As part of the hands-on curriculum for the Oceanic and Continental Waters course, Biology students participated in a field trip to the Playa El Pelado area in the General Villamil (Playas) canton.
The activity was led by professor and researcher Félix Morales, Ph.D., with logistical support and coordination from Biology student Josué Romero. During the session, students surveyed and analyzed various coastal profile zones, including:
The emergence of disoriented, dead, or severely emaciated seabirds across both the beaches of Tumbes (Peru) and the coastline and urban areas of Ecuador has raised alarms among the scientific community and environmental authorities. The phenomenon is linked to ocean thermal anomalies and conditions associated with El Niño, which force forage fish away from surface waters or drive them into deeper layers of the water column.
Anomalous sea surface warming along the Ecuadorian coastline and the insular region continues to disrupt prey availability and marine wildlife behavior. In this context, the unusual arrival of seabirds in coastal and urban areas has raised concerns among local communities and conservation experts alike.
Food security and agricultural sustainability across the inter-Andean region demand predictive modeling tools to adapt water management to the impacts of climate variability. Grounded in this objective, the oral defense was held for the postgraduate thesis titled: “Projection of potato, maize, and quinoa water requirements under climate change using CROPWAT 8.0 in Pichincha province, Ecuador,” presented by Julio Espinoza.
