Sharks are the top predator in the ocean and are vital to its ecosystem.

CNN: Shark fin soup alters an ecosystem

Experience with other fisheries has shown that ecosystem dynamics can change when a top predator is completely removed.

ECONOMIST: High time to save the Mediterranean bluefin

But there may be an answer: prove that the lionfish is not in fact a top predator after all, by getting people to eat it.

ECONOMIST: A heartening tale of business and the environment

Experience with other fisheries, such as the collapse of the cod population of the Grand Banks off Newfoundland in 1992, has shown that the dynamics of an ecosystem can change when a top predator is removed completely.

ECONOMIST: Efforts to ban the international trade in bluefin tuna

The introduction almost certainly brought about the demise of the thylacine or Tasmanian tiger, the top indigenous predator - probably because the dog was a more efficient hunter.

BBC: Dingoes 'could help rare species'