Biodiversity in 2020: the biggest threats and opportunities

Scientists and conservation professionals predict mosquito-killing fungi and a kelp crisis could be among the trends affecting living things next year

What are the biggest emerging opportunities and threats the coming year holds for efforts to conserve biodiversity? Nearly two dozen scientists, conservation professionals and future scanners recently came together to answer that question as part of an annual "horizon scan" led by Cambridge University conservation biologist William Sutherland.

The group narrowed a list of 89 issues to 15 emerging or anticipated trends that have a strong potential to benefit or harm living things but are not yet on the radar for most conservationists. Here are their top picks, published in the journal Trends in Ecology & Evolution.