Biodiversity patterns under a shifting baseline: Sensitive fish species core areas (Aim 1) 2024 dataset https://portal.medin.org.uk/portal/start.php?tpc=009_CEFAS07428f33-233f-431a-a0a4-3210fe245c2a The dataset contains outputs from Aim 1 in Bluemel et al. 2024 - Biodiversity patterns under a shifting baseline: important areas for sensitive fish species and ecosystem functioning to assist marine spatial planning (see attached), Cefas Project Report for Defra, 40 pp. The dataset includes regional core-areas (persistent areas of high fish population density) and projected spatial changes in the distribution of sensitive fish species (currently and under future environmental change) for nine focal species, including the common skate complex (Dipturus spp.), spurdog (Squalus acanthias), tope (Galeorhinus galeus), spotted ray (Raja montagui), undulate ray (Raja undulata), starry ray (Amblyraja radiata), John Dory (Zeus faber), Atlantic wolffish (Anarhichas lupus) and Atlantic halibut (Hippoglossus hippoglossus). Historic core areas / home ranges: vectors of historic core-areas (persistent areas of high fish population density) and home ranges of the nine focal species derived from standardised trawl data (survey catch-rates expressed in terms of biomass per area swept by the trawl, kg.km2) from long-term fishery-independent monitoring programmes (Lynam & Ribeiro 2022a). Where available, core areas were defined for each decade (1985 – 1994; 1995 – 2004; 2005 – 2014) where 50% of the population’s kernel density was concentrated. Similarly, the species range was defined as the areas containing 95% of the population’s kernel density. NB, there are no historic core areas available for tope. Species distributions: contains gridded rasters of the raw predicted habitat suitability projections from the Bayesian Additive Regression Trees (BART, Chipman et al., 2010) modeling algorithm for the nine fish species for the model training/current day period 2005 – 2014 ('Training') and expected habitat suitability for a species given future environmental conditions in 2050 (climate projection representative concentration pathway (RCP) 4.5 (medium emissions, high mitigation)) ('RCP4.5_2050'). Current core areas: contains vectors of current core-areas of the nine focal species derived from the expected habitat, based on a novel thresholding approach tailored to the projections of each species distribution model (SDM) by outcomes from the spatial analysis of survey-derived biomass. Future core areas under rcp4.5 emissions scenario in 2050: contains vectors of future core-areas of the nine focal species derived from the expected habitat, based on a novel thresholding approach tailored to the projections of each SDM by outcomes from the spatial analysis of survey-derived biomass. NB, no future core area is predicted for starry ray under this emissions scenario. The spatial reference for all data is WGS84/UTM zone 30N (EPSG:32630) 20250411 20240502