— CRYOSPHERE —

Cryospheric ecosystems, including ice sheets, glaciers, sea and freshwater ice, permafrost, seasonally frozen ground and snow, cover ~10% of the Earth’s surface and are under threat around the globe due to climate change.

These ecosystems are concentrated towards poles and high elevations, regions warming two or four times faster than the global average. The ongoing climate crisis is rapidly negatively affecting the cryosphere, which is shrinking, shifting, or disappearing altogether. These changes are resulting in the loss of several ecosystem services, such as water availability for local communities and lost habitat for species dependent on them.

More research is needed in the coming years to understand how ice-related landforms provide refugia for cold-adapted species in the face of climate change.

GLACIERS

The rate of glacier melt is rapidly increasing, and even more dramatic retreats are forecasted for the next decades with cascading effects on glacier environments. Overall suitable habitat for cold-adapted species will continue to shrink. In response, organisms can either move uphill, adapt, go extinct or find refugia. Some ice-related landforms may provide refugia, sheltering organisms from feeling the full brunt of rising temperatures resulting from climate change.

Rock glaciers and debris covered glaciers act as climate refugia

Rock glaciers and debris-covered glaciers more effectively shield cold-adapted organisms from climate change than debris-free glaciers. Rock glaciers are found in high-altitude and high-latitude environments, consisting of a mix of rock debris held together by interstitial ice. These tongue-shaped landforms are considered one of the best evidences of the presence of permafrost in the terrain and are naturally gradually shifting over time, with the ice changing shape in response to gravity and pressure. Debris-covered glaciers are glaciers with the majority of the surface covered by stony debris. These ice-related landforms allow cold microclimates to persist, with the rocky debris providing a thermal cover that slows down ice melt.

A 13-year field study conducted across the Italian Alps found that 21% of 43 species identified as heavily threatened by increasing temperatures have persisted on rock and debris-covered glaciers (Gobbi, Valle, Brambilla, et al., 2026). The impacts on plants and ground beetles, in particular, were found to be buffered by the cold microclimates that persist in rock and debris-covered glaciers (Gobbi, Valle, Brambilla, et al., 2026).

The impact to spiders, on the other hand, was not buffered by this microclimate (Gobbi, Valle, Brambilla, et al., 2026). These and other results can help shape conservation priorities for glacial landforms meeting the demands of the Decade of Action for Cryospheric Sciences (2025–2034) declared by the United Nations General Assembly (2024) (Gobbi, Valle, Rivalta, et al., 2026).

— RELEVANT RRC PUBLICATIONS —

Gobbi, M., Valle, B., Brambilla, M., Tampucci, D., & Caccianiga, M. (2026). Global threats, local opportunities: Ice-related landforms provide refugia for high-elevation plants and arthropods. Ecography, e08695. https://doi.org/10.1002/ecog.08695

Gobbi, M., Valle, B., Rivalta, V. T., Caccianiga, M., Lencioni, V., Ambrosini, R., & Ficetola, G. F. (2026). The EU’s cryosphere biodiversity blind spot. Science, 392, 365-366. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aeg3085

Morelli, T. L., Mozelewski, T., Cavalieri, C. N., Caven, A. J., Dreiss, L. M., Hovel, R. A., Hua, M., Jennings, M. K., John, A., Kehm, G., Keppel, G., Krawchuk, M. A., Langdon, S. F., Lawler, J. J., Lyon, L. M., Meigs, G. W., Mora-Gonzalez, M., Nadeau, C. P., Słowińska, S., … Stralberg, D. (2026). Conserving climate-change refugia: Insights from research and practice. Conservation Science and Practice, 8(1), e70160. https://doi.org/10.1111/csp2.70160

Simoncini, A., Cantera, I., Giachello, S., Valle, B., Gobbi, M., Fontaneto, D., Zawierucha, K., Laniecki, R., Coulson, S. J., Lencioni, V., Cauvy-Fraunié, S., Ordóñez, A. M., Losapio, G., Takeuchi, N., Liu, Q., Shain, D. H., Fair, H., Janko, K., Devetter, M., . . . Ficetola, G. F. (2026). The global diversity and decline of glacier animals. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 123(25), e2514455123. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2514455123

Valle, B., Barbon, G., Cucini, C., Nardi, F., Ambrosini, R., Boschi, S., Buda, J., Ficetola, G. F., Frati, F., Kováč, Ľ., Marta, S., Scotti, R., Toscano Rivalta, V., Zimmer, A., Gobbi, M., & Caccianiga, M. (2025). The Unexplored Biodiversity of ‘Glacier Fleas’ (Hexapoda: Collembola): Taxonomy, Distribution and Ecology in the European Alps and Apennines. Journal of Zoological Systematics and Evolutionary Research, 2025(1), 1616350. https://doi.org/10.1155/jzs/1616350

Valle, B., Ligi, O., Invernizzi, A., Fiaschi, T., Gobbi, M., & Caccianiga, M. (2024). Moss flora of two Alpine glacial and periglacial sites on crystalline and carbonatic bedrock. Natural History Sciences, 12(1), 13–20. https://doi.org/10.4081/nhs.2024.809

Valle, B., di Musciano, M., Gobbi, M., Bonelli, M., Colonnelli, E., Gardini, G., Migliorini, M., Pantini, P., Zanetti, A., Berrilli, E., Frattaroli, A. R., Fugazza, D., Invernizzi, A., & Caccianiga, M. (2022). Biodiversity and ecology of plants and arthropods on the last preserved glacier of the Apennines mountain chain (Italy). The Holocene, 32(8), 853–865. https://doi.org/10.1177/09596836221096292

Gobbi, M., & Lencioni, V. (2021). Glacial Biodiversity: Lessons from Ground-dwelling and Aquatic Insects. In Glaciers and the Polar Environment. IntechOpen. https://doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.92826

Gobbi, M. (2020). Global warning: Challenges, threats and opportunities for ground beetles (Coleoptera: Carabidae) in high altitude habitats. Acta Zoologica Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae, 66(Suppl.), 5–20. https://doi.org/10.17109/AZH.66.Suppl.5.2020

Valle, B., Ambrosini, R., Caccianiga, M., & Gobbi, M. (2020). Ecology of the cold-adapted species Nebria germari (Coleoptera: Carabidae): the role of supraglacial stony debris as refugium during the current interglacial period. Acta Zoologica Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae, 66(Suppl.), 199–220. https://doi.org/10.17109/AZH.66.Suppl.199.2020

Gobbi, M., Ballarin, F., Brambilla, M., Compostella, C., Isaia, M., Losapio, G., Maffioletti, C., Seppi, R., Tampucci, D. and Caccianiga, M. (2017), Life in harsh environments: carabid and spider trait types and functional diversity on a debris-covered glacier and along its foreland. Ecological Entomology, 42: 838-848. https://doi.org/10.1111/een.12456 

Tampucci, D., Azzoni, R. S., Boracchi, P., Citterio, C., Compostella, C., Diolaiuti, G., Isaia, M., Marano, G., Smiraglia, C., Gobbi, M., & Caccianiga, M. (2017). Debris-covered glaciers as habitat for plant and arthropod species: Environmental framework and colonization patterns. Ecological Complexity, 32, 42–52. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecocom.2017.09.004

Tampucci, D., Gobbi, M., Marano, G., Boracchi, P., Boffa, G., Ballarin, F., Pantini, P., Seppi, R., Compostella, C., & Caccianiga, M. (2017). Ecology of active rock glaciers and surrounding landforms: Climate, soil, plants and arthropods. Boreas, Vol. 46, pp. 185–198. 10.1111/bor.12219

Tampucci, D., Citterio, C., Gobbi, M., & Caccianiga, M. (2016). Vegetation outlines of a debris-covered glacier descending below the treeline. Plant Sociology, (53 (1)), 45–54. https://doi.org/10.7338/pls2016531/03

Gobbi, M., Ballarin, F., Compostella, C., Lencioni, V., Seppi, R., Tampucci, D., & Caccianiga, M. (2014) Physical and biological features of an active rock glacier in the Italian Alps. The Holocene, 24(11), 1624-1631. https://doi.org/10.1177/0959683614544050

Gobbi, M., Isaia, M., & De Bernardi, F. (2011). Arthropod colonisation of a debris-covered glacier. The Holocene, 21(2), 343–349. https://doi.org/10.1177/0959683610374885