With 90% of world trade carried by sea, the global network of ships criss-crossing the oceans provide perhaps the most important mode of transportation, not only for human mobility and for the exchange of goods, but also for the spread of invasive species that “hitch-hike” with these ships, particularly in the ballast tanks. These invasive species carried along these global shipping lanes are perhaps not so much a risk to the supply chain, but a risk stemming from the supply chain. In order to find out how these species travel and where they come from, in The complex network of global cargo ship movements, a team from Germany has mapped the worldwide movements in the maritime shipping network.

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