Affiliated with Queen Mary University of London
Connecting communities with nature
BioCapture is an initiative started by Bioscience students at Queen Mary University of London with the aim of improving knowledge and awareness of the importance of biodiversity in the local area of Tower Hamlets. You can use this site as a starting point to begin learning about and observing local wildlife and to get involved in documenting and identifying species through the growing field of citizen science.
We hope with our collective knowledge, passion, and enthusiasm we can raise awareness and educate the community about the vital importance of biodiversity. We believe in connecting people with the incredible natural world that surrounds them.
What is biodiversity?
Biodiversity describes the entire range of living organisms found in a given area. This includes plants, fungi, animals, and micro-organisms such as bacteria. Biodiversity can be measured at various levels. It includes diversity within species (including genetic variation), between species (how many different species there are in one area) as well as diversity at the ecosystem level (how many different ecosystems exist within one geographic region).
When biodiversity is high, ecosystems are more resilient and more able to survive change, meaning that more species survive. The natural world gives us all our resources and supports all our activities, so maintaining biodiversity is vital for our survival as well as for that of wildlife. Greater biodiversity at all levels improves the health of ecosystems and acts as a buffer against adverse changes.
With climate change increasing the pressure on many organisms to adapt to rapid change, biodiversity is threatened. Now more than ever we need to understand and conserve biodiversity, especially in areas where human disturbance is high, such as cities.
“It is that range of biodiversity that we must care for – the whole thing – rather than just one or two stars.”  -  David Attenborough
