Figure 1.
Sponge species recorded from Mediterranean marine caves through time, alongside with research effort.
Figure 2.
Research effort compared to sponge species richness in Mediterranean subareas.
For abbreviations of Mediterranean areas see Methods.
Figure 3.
Order composition of cave and overall Mediterranean Demospongiae and Homoscleromorpha.
Figure 4.
Percentages of cave-exclusive species in the Demospongiae and Homoscleromorpha orders.
Figure 5.
Average taxonomic distinctness (AvTD) for the Mediterranean subareas.
(A) cave sponge fauna, (B) overall Mediterranean sponge fauna. The central line represents the mean value and the funnel curve shows the limits for its expected values. For abbreviations of Mediterranean areas see Methods.
Figure 6.
Variation in taxonomic distinctness (VarTD) for the Mediterranean subareas.
(A) cave sponge fauna, (B) overall Mediterranean sponge fauna. The central line represents the mean value and the funnel curve shows the limits for its expected values. For abbreviations of Mediterranean areas see Methods.
Figure 7.
Resemblance of sponge assemblages in the Mediterranean subareas demonstrated in dendrograms and non-metric MDS plots.
(A, B) cave assemblages, (C, D) overall Mediterranean assemblages. In the latter analysis, data for the Levantine Basin were omitted (see Methods). For abbreviations of Mediterranean areas see Methods.
Figure 8.
Resemblance of sponge assemblages from cave zones (entrance-CE, semidark-SD, dark-D) of Mediterranean subareas.
For abbreviations of Mediterranean areas see Methods.
Figure 9.
Zoogeographic characterization of sponge species in Mediterranean subareas and throughout the Mediterranean.
(A) cave fauna, (B) overall Mediterranean fauna. For abbreviations of Mediterranean areas see Methods.
Figure 10.
Bioclimatic categories of sponge species in Mediterranean subareas and throughout the Mediterranean.
(A) cave fauna, (B) overall Mediterranean fauna. For abbreviations of Mediterranean areas see Methods.