The ongoing digital revolution in the age of big data is opening new research opportunities. Culturomics and iEcology, two emerging research areas based on the analysis of online data resources, can provide novel scientific insights and inform conservation and management efforts. To date, culturomics and iEcology have been applied primarily in the terrestrial realm. Here, we advocate for expanding such applications to the aquatic realm by providing a brief overview of these new approaches and outlining key areas in which culturomics and iEcology are likely to have the highest impact, including the management of protected areas; fisheries; flagship species identification; detection and distribution of threatened, rare, and alien species; assessment of ecosystem status and anthropogenic impacts; and social impact assessment. When deployed in the right context with awareness of potential biases, culturomics and iEcology are ripe for rapid development as low-cost research approaches based on data available from digital sources, with increasingly diverse applications for aquatic ecosystems.

Berlin Brandenburg Institute of Advanced Biodiversity Research Berlin Germany

Biology Centre of the Czech Academy of Sciences Institute of Hydrobiology České Budějovice Czech Republic

CIBIO InBio Centro de Investigação em Biodiversidade e Recursos Genéticos Laboratório Associado Instituto Superior de Agronomia Universidade de Lisboa Lisbon Portugal

CIBIO InBio Centro de Investigação em Biodiversidade e Recursos Genéticos Laboratório Associado Universidade do Porto Vairão Portugal

DBIO and CESAM Centre for Environmental and Marine Studies University of Aveiro Aveiro Portugal

Department of Botany and Biodiversity Research University of Vienna Vienna Austria

Department of Zoology and Fisheries FAFNR Czech University of Life Sciences Prague Prague Czech Republic

Division of Integrative Fisheries Management Faculty of Life Sciences Humboldt Universität zu Berlin Berlin Germany

Geography Department Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences Humboldt Universität zu Berlin Berlin Germany

Helsinki Institute of Sustainability Science University of Helsinki Helsinki Finland

Helsinki Lab of Interdisciplinary Conservation Science Department of Geosciences and Geography University of Helsinki Helsinki Finland

Institut de Ciències del Mar CSIC Barcelona Spain

Institute of Biological and Health Sciences Federal University of Alagoas Av Lourival Melo Mota Maceió Brazil

Institute of Biology Freie Universität Berlin Berlin Germany

Laboratory for Freshwater Ecology and Inland Fisheries at NORCE Norwegian Research Center Bergen Norway

Leibniz Institute of Freshwater Ecology and Inland Fisheries Berlin Germany

MARE Marine and Environmental Sciences Centre Laboratório Marítimo da Guia Faculdade de Ciências da Universidade de Lisboa Cascais Portugal

Mitrani Department of Desert Ecology The Jacob Blaustein Institutes for Desert Research Ben Gurion University of the Negev Midreshet Ben Gurion Israel

School for Resource and Environmental Studies Dalhousie University Halifax Canada

School of Zoology Tel Aviv University Tel Aviv Israel

Steinhardt Museum of Natural History Tel Aviv University Tel Aviv Israel

The Jacob Blaustein Center for Scientific Cooperation The Jacob Blaustein Institutes for Desert Research Ben Gurion University of the Negev Midreshet Ben Gurion Israel

University of South Bohemia Faculty of Science Department of Ecosystem Biology České Budějovice Czech Republic

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