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Anthropogenic drivers and global warming are altering the occurrence of infectious marine diseases, some of which produce mass mortalities with considerable ecosystemic and economic costs. The Mediterranean Sea is considered a laboratory to examine global processes, and the fan mussel Pinna nobilis a sentinel species within it. Since September 2016, fan mussels suffer a die-off, very likely provoked by the protozoan Haplosporidium pinnae. Population dynamic surveys, rescue programmes, larvae collector installation and protection of infected adults from predators, have increased knowledge about the factors conditioning the spread of the die-off; previous model simulations indicate that water temperature and salinity seem to be related to the manifestation of the disease, which at the end are strongly influenced by climate change and anthropogenic actions. The absence of natural recruitment implies that fan mussel populations are not recovering, but the survival of populations living in paralic environments provides an opportunity to study the disease and its conditioning factors. The fan mussel disease outbreak provides a case example for how climate change may mediate host-protozoan dynamics and poses several questions: are we witnessing the potential extinction of a sentinel species? Can we avoid it by applying active measures? If so, which measures will be more effective? How many other more overlooked species might experience a massive and unnoticed die-off before it is too late to implement any preservation action? This is especially relevant because the loss of keystone species can drive to community effects that influence marine ecosystem processes., This research was partially funded by the Spanish Ministry for the Ecological Transition, project 28-5310 “Rescate de 215 ejemplares de nacra (Pinna nobilis) y su mantenimiento en 5 centros especializados en el marco del Proyecto UFE IP-PAF INTEMARES (LIFE15 IPE ES 012)”, “Gestión integrada, innovadora y participativa de la Red Natura 2000 en el medio marino español” as well as those agreements and contracts with the participating entities (IFAPA, IRTA, IEO) derived from this project, and by the Prince Albert II of Monaco Foundation to project BF/HEM 15-1662, “The study, protection and possible breeding of pen shell (Pinna nobilis) in the Boka Kotorska Bay”. Maite Vázquez-Luis was supported by the postdoctoral contract, Juan de la Cierva-Incorporación (IJCI-2016-29329) of Ministerio de Ciencia, Innovación y Universidades. G. Catanese was supported by a research contract from the INIA-CCAA (DOC INIA 8/2013) MINECO programme. The M. López-Sanmartín contract is co-financed by the State Plan for Scientific and Technical Research and Innovation 2013–2016, MINECO, ref. PTA215-11709-I.

Offshore wind energy is increasingly becoming an important part of European and global low-emission power systems. The aims of this paper are to create a shared understanding on the major drivers of offshore wind development in Finland and to explore how these drivers, and opportunities for the entire industry, may develop over the twenty-first century, under different global futures. This research develops extended shared socioeconomic pathway (SSP) narratives for the offshore wind industry by using a virtual participatory workshop with expert stakeholders. According to our results, the five key drivers shaping the prospects of offshore wind development are public acceptability of offshore energy, global and national demand for low-emission energy, technological development and relative competitiveness of offshore energy, availability of space and wind resources, and energy markets and transmission infrastructure. Nationally extended SSP narratives, building on these key drivers, describe a wide range of alternative future risks and opportunities for developing offshore energy. Under sustainable development (SSP1), offshore wind is likely to soon become a major source of energy in the area, if developed in a balanced manner alongside other uses of the marine space. Under fossil-fuelled development (SSP5), offshore wind grows slower and may experience rapid uptake only in the latter half of the century. Under the regional rivalry scenario (SSP3), the need for local energy sources drives the national energy policies and may create new opportunities for offshore wind. Under the inequality scenario (SSP4), local municipalities and the residents decide on locations of new wind turbines and the overall magnitude of future offshore wind.The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s40974-022-00252-7.

The present work used multiple linear regression (MLR) models and corrgram to assess the importance of environmental parameters on diversity and abundance dynamics of Vibrio sp. in waters of few landing stages in the city of Douala (Cameroon). It was recorded in all the five selected stations, the presence of four species of Vibrio namely, Vibrio parahaemolyticus, Vibrio cholerae, Vibrio fluvialis and Vibrio alginolyticus whose highest abundance reached 5.65, 6.26, 4.9 and 4.83 log CFU/100 ml respectively. Vibrio cholerae was the most isolated during the study with a frequency of 65%. The abundance dynamics of these germs is strongly influenced by nitrates, salinity, dissolved carbon dioxyde (CO2) and ammonium ions (NH4+). The visualization of corrgram shows high degree of association between studied parameters. We note a coefficient of determination r2 = 0.50 for the multiple linear regression model for Heterotrophic Aerobic Bacteria (HAB) and a coefficient of determination r2 = 0.58 for the MLR model for V. cholerae. The physicochemical parameters explain at 43% (r2 = 0.43) the distribution of the abundances of V. parahaemolyticus, at 45% (r2 = 0.45) the distribution of abundances of V. alginolyticus and at 26% (r2 = 0.26) for V. fluvialis. Keywords: Multiple linear regression, visualization of corrgram, environmental parameters, distribution patterns, Vibrionaceae.

Multispecies bio-economic models are useful tools to give insights into ecosystem thinking and ecosystem-based management. This paper developed an age-structured multispecies bio-economic model that includes the food web relations of the grey seal, salmon, and herring, along with salmon and herring fisheries in the Baltic Sea. The results show that the increasing seal population influences salmon fisheries and stock, but the impacts on the harvest are stronger than on the stock if the targeted management policies are obeyed. If seal population growth and a low herring stock occur simultaneously, the salmon harvest could face a serious threat. In addition, scenarios of the multispecies management approach in this paper reveal a benefit that our model can evaluate the performance of different fisheries with identical or different management strategies simultaneously. The results show the most profitable scenario is that both fisheries pursuit aggregated profits and reveal a trade-off between herring fisheries and salmon fisheries. Our model indicates that the herring harvest level and the approaches to managing herring fisheries can influence the performance of salmon fisheries. The study also demonstrates a way to develop a multispecies bio-economic model that includes both migratory fish and mammalian predators.

International audience; The aim of this study was to examine the effect of positively charged (amine-modified) and negatively charged (carboxyl-modified) polystyrene nanoplastics (PS NPs) on the nanostructural, nanomechanical, and antioxidant responses of the marine diatom Cylindrotheca closterium. The results showed that both types of PS NPs, regardless of surface charge, significantly inhibited the growth of C. closterium during short-term exposure (3 and 4 days). However, longer exposure (14 days) to both PS NPs types did not significantly inhibit growth, which might be related to the detoxifying effect of the microalgal extracellular polymers (EPS) and the higher cell abundance per PS NPs concentration. The exposure of C. closterium to both types of PS NPs at concentrations above the corresponding concentrations that resulted in a 50% reduction of growth (EC50) demonstrated phytotoxic effects, mainly due to the excessive production of reactive oxygen species, resulting in increased oxidative damage to lipids and changes to antioxidant enzyme activities. Diatoms exposed to nanoplastics also showed a significant decrease in cell wall rigidity, which could make the cells more vulnerable. Atomic force microscopy images showed that positively charged PS NPs were mainly adsorbed on the cell surface, while both types of PS NPs were incorporated into the EPS that serves to protect the cells. Since microalgal EPS are an important food source for phytoplankton grazers and higher trophic levels, the incorporation of NPs into the EPS and interactions with the cell walls themselves may pose a major threat to marine microalgae and higher trophic levels and, consequently, to the health and stability of the marine ecosystem.

This article explores the “wholistic” as a central concept of “the good life” as expressed by the Bnkis, Tayal Indigenous Elders, who participated in the Day Club, Tayal territory of Northern Taiwan. In particular, we analyze the stories of care experienced by the Bnkis from the standpoint of wholistic relationships. The stories were recorded primarily between 2015 and 2018. In this analysis we used a critical qualitative design approach, privileging Tayal epistemology and informed by Tayal hermeneutics. Our results show that the concept of well-being for the Bnkis is closely linked to their relationships with people and with the land and spirituality. Through these relationships, the continuation of Gaga—Tayal law and cosmology—has been adapted organically over time. We argue that Gaga is central to Tayal Elder/Bnkis care and essential to Bnkis’ well-being. We propose that the concept of wholistic relationships embedded in the Tayal law of Gaga is vital in developing an elderly care system that is genuinely culturally relevant in the long run. This research demonstrates how the wholistic concept can improve human health and well-being, and ultimately provides an implication to sustainable development.

This paper offers an approach to long-term planning for an industrial sector that is sensitive to climate change, the state of adjacent natural environments and the associated socioeconomic developments. The paper combines exploratory and target-seeking scenarios to understand the future challenges of nature-based blue tourism under alternative global futures, and to develop sequences of actions to accomplish the best achievable future outcome for blue tourism at a local scale. We detail a bottom-up approach to scenario development for tourism, with local stakeholders developing local scenarios within the boundaries provided by the locally extended Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSPs), widely used in climate research. As a demonstration of the approach, a group of invited stakeholders developed locally extended scenario narratives and the adaptation plans for blue tourism for coastal areas surrounding the Helsinki metropolitan area in Finland. The co-creation process yielded several recommendations for immediate action concerning protection of the coastal environments, land use planning, internal communication with the sector and coordinated monitoring of economic, ecological, social and cultural sustainability indicators. The approach offers a way forward for systematically assessing the future risks and opportunities that a changing environment and society create for blue tourism. • Exploratory and normative scenarios are combined to study future challenges of blue tourism. • Locally extended SSPs provide the boundaries for adapting to changing climate and societal conditions. • A group of stakeholders developed scenario narratives and adaptation plans for coastal Helsinki. • Consistent land use and marine spatial planning are keys to safeguarding future opportunities.

Funding Information: This work was supported by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No 675997. The authors are very thankful to Prof. Dr. Mehmet Aydın from the Ordu University Fatsa Faculty of Marine Sciences for his support and contribution and to anchovy fishermen who answered our questions sincerely and patiently. We would also like to thank constructive comments received by anonymous reviewers during the peer review. Funding Information: This work was supported by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No 675997. The authors are very thankful to Prof. Dr. Mehmet Aydın from the Ordu University Fatsa Faculty of Marine Sciences for his support and contribution and to anchovy fishermen who answered our questions sincerely and patiently. We would also like to thank constructive comments received by anonymous reviewers during the peer review. Data Availability Statement: The data that is used and support the findings are publicly available. Catch and price statistics of the anchovy are openly available by the Turkish Central Statistical Database via the link: https:// biruni.tuik.gov.tr/medas/?kn=97&locale=tr. Biological parameters of the anchovy stock assessment are available in the report STECF-14-14, EUR 26896 via . Economic survey data of the anchovy fishing fleet can be made available upon request. Publisher Copyright: © 2022, Mediterranean Marine Science. All Rights Reserved. European anchovy (Engraulis encrasicolus) is the main commercially exploited fish stock in the Black Sea region, providing a vital source of livelihood and revenue for local communities and national economies. In recent decades, the Black Sea anchovy stock has faced many human-induced threats, including overfishing, eutrophication, invasive species, and climate change while these threats have raised concerns about the status and long-term productivity of the stock. To ensure sustainable levels of exploitation under potential future changes in stock productivity, we here estimate and compare a suite of biological and economic reference points under different levels of stock productivity and discount rates using an age-structured bioeconomic model setup. Our model simulations showed that optimal fishing mortalities achieving maximum sustainable yield (FMSY) and maximum economic yield (FMEY) increase at higher stock productivity but are always lower than the historically high mean levels of exploitation. Furthermore, we illustrate that the stock biomass at maximum economic yield (BMEY) is larger than the stock biomass at maximum sustainable yield (BMSY) at all stock productivities and discount rates, except at low stock productivity under high levels of discounting (i.e., 10%, 20%). By illustrating the ecological and economic benefits of reducing exploitation rates, we expect that our estimated reference points can add value to the decision-making process for the management of the European anchovy fishery and ensure long-term sustainable management even under future climate-driven changes in stock productivity.

Coastal environments, in particular heavily populated semi-enclosed marginal seas and coasts like the Baltic Sea region, are stongly affected by human activities. A multitude of human impacts, including climate change, affects the different compartments of the environment, and these effects interact with each other. As part of the Baltic Earth Assessment Reports (BEAR), we present an inventory and discussion of different human-induced factors and processes affecting the environment of the Baltic Sea region, and their interrelations. Some are naturally occurring and modified by human activities (i.e. climate change, coastal processes, hypoxia, acidification, submarine groundwater discharges, marine ecosystems, non-indigenous species, land use and land cover), some are completely human-induced (i.e. agriculture, aquaculture, fisheries, river regulations, offshore wind farms, shipping, chemical contamination, dumped warfare agents, marine litter and microplastics, tourism, coastal management), and they are all interrelated to different degrees. We present a general description and analysis of the state of knowledge on these interrelations. Our main insight is that climate change has an overarching, integrating impact on all of the other factors and can be interpreted as a background effect, which has different implications for the other factors. Impacts on the environment and the human sphere can be roughly allocated to anthropogenic drivers such as food production, energy production, transport, industry and economy. We conclude that a sound management and regulation of human activities must be implemented in order to use and keep the environments and ecosystems of the Baltic Sea region sustainably in a good shape. This must balance the human needs, which exert tremendous pressures on the systems, as humans are the overwhelming driving force for almost all changes we see. The findings from this inventory of available information and analysis of the different factors and their interactions in the Baltic Sea region can largely be transferred to other comparable marginal and coastal seas in the world.

In this paper, we present a simple theoretical, steady-state equilibrium, predator-prey model for the joint management of marine mammals and a fish species. As an empirical case, we choose cod and grey seals in the Nordic-Baltic Sea countries, and several benefits and costs related to the latter are considered. We show that the optimal grey seal population is much lower than the actual population, and this result is robust to variations in relevant parameter values. This result can be explained by the fact that the profit from harvesting cod is much higher than the net benefits from grey seals.

European sturgeon Acipenser sturio is an anadromous fish species being classified “critically endangered” with only one remaining population in the Gironde-Garonne-Dordogne basin (France). In the global warming context, this paper aims to determine the sensitivity of A. sturio early life phases to temperature and oxygen saturation. Embryos were experimentally exposed to a combination of temperature (12 to 30 °C) and oxygen (30 to 90% O2 saturation) conditions. Lethal and sublethal effects were evaluated using embryonic mortality, hatching success, malformation rate, yolk sac resorption, tissue development and swimming speed. Embryonic survival peaked at 20 °C and no survival was recorded at 30 °C regardless of the associated oxygen saturation. No hatching occurred at 50% O2 sat or below regardless of temperature. Malformation frequency appeared to be minimum at 20 °C and 90% O2 sat. Swimming speed peaked at 16 °C. The temperature optimum of early life phases of A. sturio was determined to be close to 20 °C. Its upper tolerance limit is between 26 and 30 °C and its lower tolerance limit is below 12 °C. Oxygen depletion induces sublethal effects at 70% O2 sat and lethal effects at 50% O2 sat. Within the spawning period in the Gironde-Garonne-Dordogne basin, we identified yearly favourable oxythermal windows. Consequences of climate change would depend of the phenological adaptation of the species for its spawning period.

The new EU strategy on adaptation to climate change highlights the urgency of adaptation measures while bringing forth adaptation as vitally important as a response to climate change as mitigation. In order to provide information on how adaptation to climate change has been promoted in Finland and what calls for attention next, we have compiled a comprehensive information package focusing on the following themes: adaptation policy, impacts of climate change including economic impacts, regional adaptation strategies, climate and flood risks in regions and sea areas, and the availability of scientific data. This report consists of two parts. Part 1 of the report examines the work carried out on adaptation in Finland and internationally since 2005, emphasising the directions and priorities of recent research results. The possibilities of adaptation governance are examined through examples, such as how adaptations steering is organised in of the United Kingdom. We also examine other examples and describe the Canadian Climate Change Adaptation Platform (CCAP) model. We apply current information to describe the economic impacts of climate change and highlight the related needs for further information. With regard to regional climate strategy work, we examine the status of adaptation plans by region and the status of the Sámi in national adaptation work. In part 2 of the report, we have collected information on the temporal and local impacts of climate change and compiled extensive tables on changes in weather, climate and marine factors for each of Finland's current regions, the autonomous Åland Islands and five sea areas, the eastern Gulf of Finland, the western Gulf of Finland, the Archipelago Sea, the Bothnian Sea and the Bay of Bothnia. As regards changes in weather and climate factors, the changes already observed in 1991-2020 are examined compared to 1981-2010 and future changes until 2050 are described. For weather and climate factors, we examine average temperature, precipitation, thermal season duration, highest and lowest temperatures per day, the number of frost days, the depth and prevalence of snow, the intensity of heavy rainfall, relative humidity, wind speed, and the amount of frost per season (winter, spring, summer, autumn). Flood risks, i.e. water system floods, run-off water floods and sea water floods, are discussed from the perspective of catchment areas by region. The impacts of floods on the sea in terms of pollution are also assessed by sea area, especially for coastal areas. With regard to marine change factors, we examine surface temperature, salinity, medium water level, sea flood risk, waves, and sea ice. We also describe combined risks towards sea areas. With this report, we demonstrate what is known about climate change adaptation, what is not, and what calls for particular attention. The results can be utilised to strengthen Finland's climate policy so that the implementation of climate change adaptation is strengthened alongside climate change mitigation efforts. In practice, the report serves the reform of the National Climate Change Adaptation Plan and the development of steering measures for adaptation to climate change both nationally and regionally. Due to its scale, the report also serves e.g. the United Nations’ aim of protecting marine life in the Baltic Sea and the national implementation of the EU strategy for adaptation to climate change. As a whole, the implementation of adaptation policy in Finland must be speeded up swiftly in order to achieve the objectives set and ensure sufficient progress in adaptation in different sectors. The development of binding regulation and the systematic evaluation, monitoring and support of voluntary measures play a key role.

We introduce a multistep modeling approach for studying optimal management of fertilizer inputs in a situation where soil nitrogen and carbon dynamics and water and atmosphere externalities are considered. The three steps in the modeling process are: (1) generation of the data sets with a detailed simulation model; (2) estimation of the system models from the data; (3) application of the obtained dynamic economic optimization model considering inorganic and organic fertilizer inputs. We demonstrate the approach with a case study: barley production in southern Finland on coarse and clay soils. Our results show that there is a synergy between climate change mitigation and water protection goals, and a trade-off between pollution mitigation and crop production goals. If a field is a significant source of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and an insignificant source of water pollution, atmospheric externalities dominate the water externalities, even for a relatively low social cost of carbon (SCC). If a field is a significant source of water pollution, the SCC would have to be very high before atmospheric externalities dominate water externalities. In addition, an integrated nutrient management system appears better than a system in which only inorganic or organic fertilizer is used, although manure is not a solution to agriculture's GHG emissions problem. Moreover, GHG emissions and nitrogen and carbon leaching mitigation efforts should first be targeted at coarse soils rather than clay soils, because the marginal abatement costs are considerably lower for coarse soils.

Aquatic ecosystem services are important for human wellbeing, but they are much less studied than terrestrial ecosystem services. The objectives of this study are to broaden, itemize and exemplify the human-nature interactions in modeling the future provision of aquatic ecosystem services. We include shared socioeconomic and representative concentration pathways, used extensively in climate research, as drivers of change for the future development of the Baltic Sea. Then we use biogeochemical and ecosystem models to demonstrate the future development of exemplary supporting, provisioning and cultural ecosystem services for two distinct combinations of regionally downscaled global climate and socioeconomic futures. According to the model simulations, the two global futures ("Sustainable well-being" vs. "Fossil-fuelled development") studied lead to clearly deviating trajectories in the provision of marine ecosystem services. Under the "Sustainable well-being"-scenario primary production decreases by 20%, catches of demersal fish increases and the recreation opportunities increase significantly by the end of the ongoing century. Under the "fossil-fuelled development"-scenario primary production doubles, fisheries focus on less valued pelagic fish and the recreation possibilities will decrease. Long-term projections of aquatic ecosystem services prepared for alternative global socioeconomic futures can be used by policy makers and managers to adaptively and iteratively adjust mitigation and adaptation effort with plausible future changes in the drivers of water pollution.

DNA barcoding and metabarcoding is increasingly used to effectively and precisely assess and monitor biodiversity in aquatic ecosystems. As these methods rely on data availability and quality of barcode reference libraries, it is important to develop and follow best practices to ensure optimal quality and traceability of the metadata associated with the reference barcodes used for identification. Sufficient metadata, as well as vouchers, corresponding to each reference barcode must be available to ensure reliable barcode library curation and, thereby, provide trustworthy baselines for downstream molecular species identification. This document (1) specifies the data and metadata required to ensure the relevance, the accessibility and traceability of DNA barcodes and (2) specifies the recommendations for DNA harvesting and for the storage of both voucher specimens/samples and barcode data, (undefined)

This paper introduces a framework for extending global climate and socioeconomic scenarios in order to study agricultural nutrient pollution on an individual catchment scale. Our framework builds on and extends Representative Concentration Pathways (RCPs) and Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSPs) at the spatial and temporal scales that are relevant for the drivers of animal husbandry, manure recycling and the application of inorganic fertilisers in crop production. Our case study area is the Aura river catchment in South-West Finland, which discharges into the heavily eutrophic Baltic Sea. The Aura river catchment has intensive agriculture - both livestock and crop production. Locally adjusted and interpreted climate and socioeconomic scenarios were used as inputs to a field-level economic optimisation in order to study how farmers might react to the changing markets and climate conditions under different SSPs. The results on economically optimal fertilisation levels were then used as inputs to the spatially and temporally explicit nutrient loading model (VEMALA). Alternative manure recycling strategies that matched with SSP narratives were studied as means to reduce the phosphorus (P) overfertilisation in areas with high livestock density. According to our simulations, on average the P loads increased by 18% during 2071-2100 from the current level and the variation in P loads between scenarios was large (from & minus;14% to +50%). By contrast, the nitrogen (N) loads had decreased on average by & minus;9% (with variation from & minus;20% to +3%) by the end of the current century. Phosphorus loading was most sensitive to manure recycling strategies and the speed of climate change. Nitrogen loading was less sensitive to changes in climate and socioeconomic drivers. (c) 2021 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

We develop a modeling framework, based on discrete-time dynamic optimization, to study the effect of legacy nutrient stores and soil nutrient dynamics on optimal nutrient management and agri-environmental policy in crop production. Three alternative measures are studied to reduce nutrient loss: reduced fertilization, nonlegume catch crop cultivation and gypsum amendment. According to our results, landowner can bring down excessively high phosphorus stocks causing environmental damage within decades, by simultaneous optimization of the nitrogen and phosphorus fertilizers on the economic basis of profit maximization. Our results suggest that nitrogen loss abatement with catch crops is socially optimal, whereas the use of gypsum is well justified as a temporary measure on soils with high soil phosphorus levels. A dynamic tax-subsidy-scheme, which takes into account the current soil nutrient levels and field attributes such as soil texture, can enforce the socially optimal outcome. The welfare losses of the static steady-state-based tax-subsidy-schemes are increasing functions of the legacy nutrient stores and soil's ability to hold nutrients. Recommendations for Resource Managers We develop a modeling framework to study the effect of the legacy nutrient stores and the soil nutrient dynamics on the optimal nutrient management and agri-environmental policy in crop production. Nonlegume catch crop cultivation is a socially optimal long-term measure for nitrogen loss abatement, whereas phosphorus loss abatement with gypsum is socially optimal on soils with high soil phosphorus levels. A dynamic tax-subsidy-scheme, which is adjusted annually according to the soil nutrient stocks, leads to social optimum. Although this can be difficult to implement in practice, it can be useful in the derivation of the simpler, static tax-subsidy-schemes. If a gypsum subsidy is paid for those years, where the soil P level is above the threshold level for the gypsum application, the welfare loss of the static steady-state-based tax-subsidy-schemes is almost zero. Simultaneous adjustment of the N and P fertilizer rates enables the use of simple, static and soil-texture-ignorant tax-subsidy schemes, without a notable social welfare loss

Pikeperch (Sander lucioperca) has a high potential for inland aquaculture diversification in Europe. Bottlenecks (i.e. low survival, cannibalism and deformity rates) hamper further expansion of pikeperch culture, because of the weak production performances at the nursery level. To improve the production of pikeperch juveniles under recirculation system we used a pilot scale larval rearing system (700 L tanks) and multifactorial designs. Three successive larval rearing trials (duration: 35-49 days) were conducted to identify the best combination of environmental, feeding and population factors. Considering the main significant effects observed on survival, growth, swim bladder inflation rates and biomass gain, a favourable combination of twelve factor (F) modalities was proposed (F1- initial density: 100 larvae.L-1, F2- no sorting of fish jumper, F3- no sibling population, F4- eggs from large females, F5- discontinuous feeding, F6- no co-feeding, F7- light intensity: 50 lx, F8- beginning of the weaning at 16 dph (days post-hatching), F9- weaning duration: 9 days, F10- water renewal rate of 100 % per hour, F11- tank cleaning during morning and F12- tank bottom-up water current). A final validation step was realized over a last trial (seven replicates, duration: 49 days), and validated with the best productive results obtained over the global experimental period (2015-2018). These results were: a final body weight of 815.64 ± 95.34 mg, a survival rate of 16.9 ± 1.7 %, a specific growth rate of 15.1 ± 5.9 %.d-1, a final fish biomass of 9.55 ± 0.23 kg, a swim bladder inflation rate of 92.6 ± 3.2 % and a food conversion rate of 0.65 ± 0.02 (dry food). The final stocking density was 13.6 kg.m-3 of rearing volume. Authors were able to validate and provide a reliable basic protocol for pikeperch larval rearing using recirculating units. info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion

This paper studies the relative importance of societal drivers and changing climate on anthropogenic nutrient inputs to the Baltic Sea. Shared Socioeconomic Pathways and Representative Concentration Pathways are extended at temporal and spatial scales relevant for the most contributing sectors. Extended socioeconomic and climate scenarios are then used as inputs for spatially and temporally detailed models for population and land use change, and their subsequent impact on nutrient loading is computed. According to the model simulations, several factors of varying influence may either increase or decrease total nutrient loads. In general, societal drivers outweigh the impacts of changing climate. Food demand is the most impactful driver, strongly affecting land use and nutrient loads from agricultural lands in the long run. In order to reach the good environmental status of the Baltic Sea, additional nutrient abatement efforts should focus on phosphorus rather than nitrogen. Agriculture is the most important sector to be addressed under the conditions of gradually increasing precipitation in the region and increasing global demand for food. (C) 2020 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V.

The present work, which is the first comparative study of the growth of the fan mussel Pinna nobilis in the western Mediterranean, encompasses 12 populations of this species living in different environments in France and Spain. Two hundred nine shells were processed and used to obtain growth records from the posterior adductor muscle scar. Size-at-age data were fitted to the Von Bertalanffy growth model. Considerable variability in growth parameters and age was detected among the populations. The results show that the only two fan mussel populations remaining in Spain, which live in an estuary and a coastal lagoon, occupy habitats that are optimal for fast growth, but individuals show low longevity, complicating the long-term conservation of the species. Multivariate analyses groups the populations into three groups (SO, EO and LG), and a general model is proposed for each group; the model can be used as an approximation to calculate the ages of individuals living in similar environments, Sí

Este artículo contiene 18 páginas, 4 figuras., Good datasets of geo-referenced records of alien species are a prerequisite for assessing the spatio-temporal dynamics of biological invasions, their invasive potential, and the magnitude of their impacts. However, with the exception of first records on a country level or wider regions, observations of species presence tend to remain unpublished, buried in scattered repositories or in the personal databases of experts. Through an initiative to collect, harmonize and make such unpublished data for marine alien and cryptogenic species in the Mediterranean Sea available, a large dataset comprising 5376 records was created. It includes records of 239 alien or cryptogenic taxa (192 Animalia, 24 Plantae, 23 Chromista) from 19 countries surrounding the Mediterranean Sea. In terms of records, the most reported Phyla in descending order were Chordata, Mollusca, Chlorophyta, Arthropoda, and Rhodophyta. The most recorded species was Caulerpa cylindracea, followed by Siganus luridus, Magallana sp. (cf. gigas or angulata) and Pterois miles. The dataset includes records from 1972 to 2020, with the highest number of records observed in 2018. Among the records of the dataset, Dictyota acutiloba is a first record for the Mediterranean Sea. Nine first country records are also included: the alga Caulerpa taxifolia var. distichophylla, the cube boxfish Ostracion cubicus, and the cleaner shrimp Urocaridella pulchella from Israel; the sponge Paraleucilla magna from Libya and Slovenia; the lumpfish Cyclopterus lumpus from Cyprus; the bryozoan Celleporaria vermiformis and the polychaetes Prionospio depauperata and Notomastus aberans from Malta., The publication of this article is supported by the Open Access Publishing Fund of the International Association for Open Knowledge on Invasive Alien Species (INVASIVESNET; www.invasivesnet.org). Stelios Katsanevakis, Maria Sini and Konstantinos Tsirintanis were supported by the Hellenic Foundation for Research and Innovation (H.F.R.I.) under the “First Call for H.F.R.I. Research Projects to support Faculty members and Researchers and the procurement of high-cost research equipment grant” (Project Number: HFRI-FM17-1597). Enalia Physis acknowledges Pantelis Patsalou for his support with field-logistics and links with fishers. Fiona Tomas would like to acknowledge funding from FECYT FCT- 14-9319 (¡OJO A LAS INVASORAS! BIODIVERSIDAD Y ESPECIES INVASORAS DEL MEDITERRÁNEO BALEAR). Vasilis Gerovasileiou, Thanos Dailianis and Maria Sini acknowledge the support by the MARISCA project (www.marisca.eu), co-funded (85%) by EEA GRANTS, 2009–2014, and the Public Investments Program (PIP) of the Hellenic Republic (15%). Razy Hoffman acknowledges funding by Yad-Hanadiv foundation, through the Israel Society of Ecology and Environmental Sciences and Israel Nature and Parks Authority (An integrated program for establishing biological baselines and monitoring protocols for marine reserves in the Israeli Mediterranean Sea). Argyro Zenetos and Paraskevi K. Karachle would like to thank the citizenscientists collaborating with the Ellenic Network on Aquatic Invasive Species (ELNAIS – elnais.hcmr.gr). Nikolaos Doumpas, Ioannis Giovos, Periklis Kleirou and Francesco Tiralongo would like to thank all the citizen-scientists that contributed with their shared records and data in the citizen-science project “Is it alien to you? Share it!!!” (https://www.facebook.com/ groups/104915386661854/). Data from Gyaros Island marine reserve were collected under the “GyarosMPA” project, funded by “MAVA Fondation pour la Nature”. Data from Corsica coastline were mainly collected in the framework of the “Corsica Alien Network” initiated by “Office de l’Environnement de la Corse”. Carla Morri and Carlo Nike Bianchi received financial support from FFARB (funds for basic research activities) by the Italian Ministry of Education, University and Research. Ergün Taşkın has been supported by TÜBİTAK, Ankara, Turkey (Project Number: 114Y238). The Slovenian authors would like to acknowledge their financial support from the Slovenian Research Agency (research core funding No. P1-0237) and the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Food of the Republic of Slovenia. Mehmet Fatih Huseyinoglu thanks University of Kyrenia’s Scientific Research Project numbered GRN-20191-004. Fabio Crocetta was funded by the COST (European Cooperation in Science and Technology) Action TD1209 Alien Challenge project. The FRI (HAO DEMETER) team is very grateful to the Marine Strategy Project for financial support. Records of NIS in Jbel Moussa, the National Park of Al Hoceima and Cap des Trois Fourches sites from Morocco were obtained during surveys conducted within the framework of the MedKeyHabitats and the MedMPAnet Projects implemented by UNEP/MAP-RAC/SPA in close collaboration with the Haut Commissariat aux Eaux et Forêts et à la Lutte Contre la Désertification (HCEFLCD) and financially supported by RAC/SPA, Tunisia and the MAVA Foundation, Switzerland (MedKeyHabitats Project) and the European Commission (EC), the Spanish Agency for International Cooperation to Development (AECID), and the French Global Environment Facility (MedMPAnet Project). Jamila Ben Souissi was partially funded by BiodivMex /Chantier MISTRALS. Konstantinos Tsiamis sampling records were retrieved during his post in the Hellenic Centre for Marine Research, which he would like to thank for. Periklis Kleitou and Demetris Kletou were supported by the LIFE financial instrument of the European Union – RELIONMED project [Grant Agreement LIFE16 NAT/ CY/000832]. Some of the data included in the dataset were obtained through the marine citizen science platform Observadores del Mar www.observadoresdelmar.es with the support of FECYT FCT-17-12469, LIFE IP Intemares and Fundació Marilles, and through the citizen science site of the Italian Marine Protected Area of “Regno di Nettuno” (islands of Ischia, Procida and Vivara): www.citizensciencerdn.org. Most data from Lebanon were retrieved from social media dedicated to citizen science (Facebook group: Sea Lebanon https://www.facebook.com/ groups/109615625861815/) or fishers and scuba divers WhatsApp groups). Jamila Rizgalla wishes to thank the administration of Regatta for granting a free pass to conduct field surveys and the security personnel for providing a safe environment. Anna Occhipinti-Ambrogi was supported by European Community’s Seventh Framework Program VECTORS (Vectors of Change in Oceans and Seas Marine Life, Impact on Economic Sectors). The long lasting collaboration with the ICES Working Group on Introductions and Transfer of Marine Organisms (WGITMO) has been a good forum where many information and ideas could be exchanged within some of the authors (Anna Occhipinti-Ambrogi, Argyro Zenetos, Agnese Marchini, and a wider community of scientists working on biological invasions). A. Rosso and R. Sanfilippo received grants from the Catania University Research Plan 2016/2018. Data from Kuriat island were collected under the “Kuriat project”, funded by “MAVA Fondation pour la Nature” executed by SPA/RAC in partnership with the Coastal Protection and Management Agency (APAL) and Notre Grand Bleu (NGB) NGO. The AIS/ERA (Environment and Resources Authority) Maltese data were obtained from the EU funded project EMFF 8.3.1 under the European Maritime and Fisheries Fund 2014–2020 with a total cost of €1.6 million in public eligible EMFF funds (75% EU 25% MT), managed by AIS/ERA (Environment and Resources Authority). The ultimate goals of this European Maritime and Fisheries Fund (EMFF 2014–2020) project are to devise a holistic approach towards marine monitoring and develop a comprehensive database of data collected about the Maltese waters., With the funding support of the ‘Severo Ochoa Centre of Excellence’ accreditation (CEX2019-000928-S), of the Spanish Research Agency (AEI)

WOS: 000504936100005, In this study, we analyzed social and economic dimensions of shore-based recreational fishing (RF) along Izmir Inner Bay in the Metropolitan Province Izmir of Turkey. 634 shore-based recreational fishers were interviewed via on-site face-to-face interviews during the fishing activity from January to December in 2016. Market value approach was utilized to calculate net economic values and expenses of recreational fishers along in eight coastal districts, Goztepe, Karatas, Konak, Pasaport, Alsancak, Bayrakli, Karsiyaka and Bostanli along the coast of the inner bay. the annual fishing efforts demonstrated significant differences among districts. For example; Bostanli fishers that have higher education levels with higher income spent higher time for RF but, finally, this attitude of Bostanli fishers resulted in low CPUE levels. Considering the RF experience of Bostanli fishers, they are either not likely or able to target or catch bigger or more fish. in contrast, Goztepe fishers seems much professional compared to fishers by having the highest amount of catch in shortest time compared to rest of the districts. the highest mean CPUE was observed for Goztepe, Karatas and Konak fishers even so, these CPUE amounts were much under the ones determined in previous studies in Turkey. Considering the catch composition of fishers, S. auratus was the most common catch for all fishers. Secondly, D. labrax and Mugilid species constituted the majority. High fishing related expenditures were observed in all districts, then harvesting values reached quite high levels considering the previous studies. To conclude, RF in Izmir Inner Bay of Turkey is great social and economic activity by generating increase in RF related expenditures, jobs and indirect economic activity in services sector. the results of this study provide an update information of the recreational fishers' profile to help regulate recreational fishery., MARMAED project from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant [675997]; [TAGEM 2015-ARGE-15], This paper is the output of the research project called number of "TAGEM 2015-ARGE-15". the authors are thankful for the efforts by the officers of the fishery directorate of Izmir and researchers (Huseyin Akbas, Levent Ozkan, Gulusan Emanet Ergul, Erdinc Veske, Hacer Akyurek, M. Tolga Dincer and M. Hakan Kaykac) and Master Student/s "Esra Eryagci". the authors are very thankful to all recreational fishers who honestly and patiently answered all questions in the forms.; This study was supported by the MARMAED project that has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant agreement No 675997.

The Baltic Sea is suffering from eutrophication caused by nutrient discharges from land to sea, and these loads might change in a changing climate. We show that the impact from climate change by mid-century is probably less than the direct impact of changing socioeconomic factors such as land use, agricultural practices, atmospheric deposition, and wastewater emissions. We compare results from dynamic modelling of nutrient loads to the Baltic Sea under projections of climate change and scenarios for shared socioeconomic pathways. Average nutrient loads are projected to increase by 8% and 14% for nitrogen and phosphorus, respectively, in response to climate change scenarios. In contrast, changes in the socioeconomic drivers can lead to a decrease of 13% and 6% or an increase of 11% and 9% in nitrogen and phosphorus loads, respectively, depending on the pathway. This indicates that policy decisions still play a major role in climate adaptation and in managing eutrophication in the Baltic Sea region. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (10.1007/s13280-019-01243-5) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

We developed numerical simulations of potential future ecological states of the Baltic Sea ecosystem at the end of century under five scenarios. We used a spatial food web (Ecospace) model, forced by a physical–biogeochemical model. The scenarios are built on consistent storylines that describe plausible developments of climatic and socioeconomic factors in the Baltic Sea region. Modelled species diversity and fish catches are driven by climate- and nutrient load-related changes in habitat quality and by fisheries management strategies. Our results suggest that a scenario including low greenhouse gas concentrations and nutrient pollution and ecologically focused fisheries management results in high biodiversity and catch value. On the other hand, scenarios envisioning increasing societal inequality or economic growth based on fossil fuels, high greenhouse gas emissions and high nutrient loads result in decreased habitat quality and diminished biodiversity. Under the latter scenarios catches are high but they predominantly consist of lower-valued fish. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (10.1007/s13280-019-01229-3) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Game theory has been an effective tool to generate solutions for decision making in fisheries involving multiple countries and fleets. Here, we use a coupled bio-economic model based on a Baltic Sea dynamic multispecies food web model called BALMAR and, we compare non-cooperative (NC) and cooperative game (grand coalition: GC) solutions. Applications of game theory based on a food web model under climate change have not been studied before and the present study aims to fill this gap in the literature. The study focuses on the effects of climate variability on the biological, harvest and economic output of the game models by examining two different climate scenarios, a first scenario characterized by low temperature and high salinity and a second scenario by high temperature and low salinity. Our results showed that in the first scenario sprat spawning stock biomass (SSB) and harvest dropped dramatically both in the NC and the GC cases whereas, herring and cod SSBs and harvests were higher compared to a base scenario (BS) keeping temperature and salinity at mean historical levels. In the second scenario, the sprat SSB and the harvest was higher for both GC and NC cases while the cod and the herring SSBs and harvests were lower. The total GC payoffs clearly outperformed the NC payoffs across all scenarios. Likewise, the first and second scenario GC payoffs for countries were higher except for Poland. The findings suggested the climate vulnerability of Baltic Sea multi-species fisheries and these results would support future decision-making processes of Baltic Sea fisheries.

Climate and land-use change drive a suite of stressors that shape ecosystems and interact to yield complex ecological responses (that is, additive, antagonistic and synergistic effects). We know little about the spatial scales relevant for the outcomes of such interactions and little about effect sizes. These knowledge gaps need to be filled to underpin future land management decisions or climate mitigation interventions for protecting and restoring freshwater ecosystems. This study combines data across scales from 33 mesocosm experiments with those from 14 river basins and 22 cross-basin studies in Europe, producing 174 combinations of paired-stressor effects on a biological response variable. Generalized linear models showed that only one of the two stressors had a significant effect in 39% of the analysed cases, 28% of the paired-stressor combinations resulted in additive effects and 33% resulted in interactive (antagonistic, synergistic, opposing or reversal) effects. For lakes, the frequencies of additive and interactive effects were similar for all spatial scales addressed, while for rivers these frequencies increased with scale. Nutrient enrichment was the overriding stressor for lakes, with effects generally exceeding those of secondary stressors. For rivers, the effects of nutrient enrichment were dependent on the specific stressor combination and biological response vari- able. These results vindicate the traditional focus of lake restoration and management on nutrient stress, while highlighting that river management requires more bespoke management solutions. This work was supported by the MARS project (Managing Aquatic Ecosystems and Water Resources under Multiple Stress) funded under the 7th EU Framework Programme, Theme 6 (Environment including Climate Change), contract no. 603378 (http://www.mars-project.eu). Further support was received through the ILES (SAW- 2015-IGB-1) and BIBS (BMBF 01LC1501G) projects. Partner organizations provided 25% cofunding through their institutional budgets. We thank J. Strackbein, J. Lorenz and L. Mack for their support. This work was supported by the MARS project (Managing Aquatic Ecosystems and Water Resources under Multiple Stress) funded under the 7th EU Framework Programme, Theme 6 (Environment including Climate Change), contract no. 603378 (http://www.mars-project.eu). Further support was received through the ILES (SAW- 2015-IGB-1) and BIBS (BMBF 01LC1501G) projects. Partner organizations provided 25% cofunding through their institutional budgets. We thank J. Strackbein, J. Lorenz and L. Mack for their support.

International audience; Cryptosporidium, a zoonotic pathogen, is able to infect a wide range of hosts including wild and domestic animals, and humans. Although it is well known that some parasites are both fish pathogens and recognized agents of zoonosis with a public health impact, little information is available concerning the prevalence of Cryptosporidium in wild aquatic environments. To evaluate the prevalence of Cryptosporidium spp. in commercially important edible marine fish in different European seas (English channel, North sea, Bay of Biscay, Celtic sea and Mediterranean sea), 1,853 specimens were collected as part of two surveys. Nested PCR followed by sequence analysis at the 18S rRNA gene locus was used to identify Cryptosporidium spp. The overall prevalence of Cryptosporidium spp. in sampled fish reached 2.3% (35 out of 1,508) in a first campaign and 3.2% (11 out of 345) in a second campaign. Sequence and phylogenetic analysis of positive samples identified Cryptosporidium parvum (n = 10) and seven genotypes which exhibited between 7.3 and 10.1% genetic distance from C. molnari, with the exception of one genotype which exhibited only 0.5-0.7% genetic distance from C. molnari. Among 31 analyzed fish species, 11 (35.5%) were identified as potential hosts for Cryptosporidium. A higher prevalence of Cryptosporidium spp. was observed in larger fish, in fish collected during the spring-summer period, and in those caught in the North East Atlantic. Pollachius virens (saithe) was the most frequently Cryptosporidium positive species. In fish infected by other parasites, the risk of being Cryptosporidium positive increased 10-fold (OR: 9.95, CI: 2.32–40.01.04, P = 0.0002). Four gp60 subtypes were detected among the C. parvum positive samples: IIaA13G1R1, IIaA15G2R1, IIaA17G2R1, and IIaA18G3R1. These C. parvum subtypes have been previously detected in terrestrial mammals and may constitute an additional source of infection for other animals and in particular for humans. Microscopical examination of histological sections confirmed the presence of round bodies suggestive of the development of C. parvum within digestive glands. We report herein the first epidemiological and molecular data concerning the detection of Cryptosporidium in edible marine fish in European seas surrounding France broadening its host range anduncovering potential novel infection routes.

Long-term scenario analyses can be powerful tools to explore plausible futures of human development under changing environmental, social, and economic conditions and to evaluate implications of different approaches to reduce pollution and resource overuse. Vulnerable ecosystems like the Baltic Sea in North-Eastern Europe tend to be under pressure from multiple, interacting anthropogenic drivers both related to the local scale (e.g. land use change) and the global scale (e.g. climate change). There is currently a lack of scenarios supporting policy-making that systematically explore how global and regional developments could concurrently impact the Baltic Sea region. Here, we present five narratives for future development in the Baltic Sea region, consistent with the global Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSPs) developed for climate research. We focus on agriculture, wastewater treatment, fisheries, shipping, and atmospheric deposition, which all represent major pressures on the Baltic Sea. While we find strong links between the global pathways and regional pressures, we also conclude that each pathway may very well be the host of different sectoral developments, which in turn may have different impacts on the ecosystem state. The extended SSP narratives for the Baltic Sea region are intended as a description of sectoral developments at regional scale that enable detailed scenario analysis and discussions across different sectors and disciplines, but within a common context. In addition, the extended SSPs can readily be combined with climate pathways for integrated scenario analysis of regional environmental problems.

This paper compares two fisheries management objectives recognized in the literature and applied in practice: maximum sustainable yield (MSY) and maximum economic yield (MEY). The European Union Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) sets the minimum target of fish populations at the MSY level, defined as the stock level that maximizes the fish catch. Although MSY is useful in nudging over-harvested stocks back to biologically sustainable levels, the CFP requires the harvested stocks to be maintained above levels that can produce MSY without addressing the exact definition of “above MSY”. One possibility for maintaining fish stocks above MSY is to apply the maximum economic yield (MEY) that maximizes the discounted net present value of the fishery. Comparison of the economic and ecological outcomes of the two objectives in the Northern Baltic salmon fishery is conducted by applying a dynamic optimization model coupled with age-structured salmon stock dynamics. The results are further tested for the changes in stock-recruitment parameters, and related to the precautionary management target of reaching 75% smolt production capacity. A sensitivity analysis for the economic parameter values is conducted. The results show that as a target, MEY performs better than MSY in both conserving the stocks and providing economic viability for the fishers. Targeting MEY while keeping MSY at hand as a minimum biological objective was found to be a pragmatic objective that is in line with the goals of the CFP and the EU Blue Growth Strategy.

International audience; Large-scale studies are needed to identify the drivers of total mercury (THg) and monomethyl-mercury (MeHg) concentrations in aquatic ecosystems. Studies attempting to link dissolved organic matter (DOM) to levels of THg or MeHg are few and geographically constrained. Additionally, stream and river systems have been understudied as compared to lakes. Hence, the aim of this study was to examine the influence of DOM concentration and composition, morphological descriptors, land uses and water chemistry on THg and MeHg concentrations and the percentage of THg as MeHg (%MeHg) in 29 streams across Europe spanning from 41°N to 64°N. THg concentrations (0.06e2.78 ng L-1) were highest in streams characterized by DOM with a high terrestrial soil signature and low nutrient content. MeHg concentrations (7.8 e159 pg L-1) varied non-systematically across systems. Relationships between DOM bulk characteristics and THg and MeHg suggest that while soil derived DOM inputs control THg concentrations, autochthonous DOM (aquatically produced) and the availability of electron acceptors for Hg methylatingmicroorganisms (e.g. sulfate) drive %MeHg and potentially MeHg concentration. Overall, these results highlight the large spatial variability in THg and MeHg concentrations at the European scale, and underscore the importance of DOM composition on mercury cycling in fluvial systems.

Game theory studies the strategic interactions between and among decision makers, players, through mathematical models called games. This paper presents an overview on the evolution of the application of game theory to fisheries economics. The first applications emerged in the late 1970s, focussing upon internationally shared fish stocks. This occurred in the context of the UN Third Conference on the Law of the Sea, and the 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea. During the 1980s and early 1990s the application of game theory to fisheries focused mainly on transboundary fish stocks. Thereafter, the applications to straddling fish stocks developed significantly, through the use of coalition games. This was a consequence of the mismanagement of these stocks, and the management regime brought forth in response by the 1995 UN Fish Stocks Agreement. The application of game theory to the management of national/regional fisheries is a new research frontier, as it is still much underexplored, when compared to international fisheries. This paper also summarizes the main research developments of a set of nine papers selected for this special issue on Game Theory and Fisheries.

Coastal global oceans are expected to undergo drastic changes driven by climate change and increasing anthropogenic pressures in coming decades. Predicting specific future conditions and assessing the best management strategies to maintain ecosystem integrity and sustainable resource use are difficult, because of multiple interacting pressures, uncertain projections, and a lack of test cases for management. We argue that the Baltic Sea can serve as a time machine to study consequences and mitigation of future coastal perturbations, due to its unique combination of an early history of multistressor disturbance and ecosystem deterioration and early implementation of cross-border environmental management to address these problems. The Baltic Sea also stands out in providing a strong scientific foundation and accessibility to long-term data series that provide a unique opportunity to assess the efficacy of management actions to address the breakdown of ecosystem functions. Trend reversals such as the return of top predators, recovering fish stocks, and reduced input of nutrient and harmful substances could be achieved only by implementing an international, cooperative governance structure transcending its complex multistate policy setting, with integrated management of watershed and sea. The Baltic Sea also demonstrates how rapidly progressing global pressures, particularly warming of Baltic waters and the surrounding catchment area, can offset the efficacy of current management approaches. This situation calls for management that is (i) conservative to provide a buffer against regionally unmanageable global perturbations, (ii) adaptive to react to new management challenges, and, ultimately, (iii) multisectorial and integrative to address conflicts associated with economic trade-offs.

Nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) are both essential plant nutrients. However, their joint response to plant growth is seldom described by models. This study provides an approach for modeling the joint impact of inorganic N and P fertilization on crop production, considering the P supplied by the soil, which was approximated using the soil test P (STP). We developed yield response models for Finnish spring barley crops (Hordeum vulgare L.) for clay and coarse-textured soils by using existing extensive experimental datasets and nonlinear estimation techniques. Model selection was based on iterative elimination from a wide diversity of plausible model formulations. The Cobb-Douglas type model specification, consisting of multiplicative elements, performed well against independent validation data, suggesting that the key relationships that determine crop responses are captured by the models. The estimated models were extended to dynamic economic optimization of fertilization inputs. According to the results, a fair STP level should be maintained on both coarse-textured soils (9.9 mg L-1 a(-1)) and clay soils (3.9 mg L-1 a(-1)). For coarse soils, a higher steady-state P fertilization rate is required (21.7 kg ha(-1) a(-1)) compared with clay soils (6.75 kg ha(-1) a(-1)). The steady-state N fertilization rate was slightly higher for clay soils (102.4 kg ha(-1) a(-1)) than for coarse soils (95.8 kg ha(-1) a(-1)). This study shows that the iterative elimination of plausible functional forms is a suitable method for reducing the effects of structural uncertainty on model output and optimal fertilization decisions.

Diatoms are used routinely to assess pollution level in rivers and lakes. Current methods are based on identification by light microscopy, which is laborious. An alternative is to identify species based on short DNA fragments and High-Throughput Sequencing (HTS). However a potential limitation is the incomplete coverage of species in reference barcode libraries. Usually these libraries are compiled by isolating cells, before culturing and sequencing them, which is tedious and often unsuccessful. Here we propose the use of rbcL sequences from environmental samples analysed by HTS. We set several criteria to ensure good sequence quality and correspondence with the target species observed in microscopy: the sequence needed to be abundant in the sample, and with no insertions nor deletions or stop codon, phylogenetic neighbour taxa had to correspond to neighbour taxonomic taxa expected from morphological observations. Four species from tropical rivers are given as examples, including one that is new to science. info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion

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[EN] The development of aquaculture activities has posed an alternative solution for the preservation of some overexploited shell¿sh ¿sheries worldwide. In the same way, endemic Mediterranean bivalves such as Pinna nobilis, highly threatened by habitat loss and coastal pollution, could found in aquaculture a solution for preserving the continuity of the species. Given the endangered status of the species, the biological and ecological processes regulating natural populations have been well studied, but there are still important knowledge gaps preventing the development of viable arti¿cial cultures. This study describes for the ¿rst time the larval development of P. nobilis (from fertilization until pediveliger larval stages) in captivity conditions. Moreover, di¿erent rearing tanks of 5, 16 and 80 L, larvae density from 1 to 600 larvae mL¿1, light conditions, food doses, were tested in order to establish the bases for the optimal rearing of the species and provide a source of individuals for restoring ¿eld populations. Results showed that 16 L tanks with a concentration of 2 larvae mL¿1, constant temperature of 21 °C, 12/12 h photoperiod and fed with an ¿optimal¿ mixture of 25 cells per ¿L of Chaetoceros calcitrans + 33.3 cells per¿L ofPavlova lutheri + 100 cells per¿L ofIsochrysis galbana¿ appear to be the best conditions to rearlarvae ofP. nobilis.Di¿erentcaptivity conditions such as loweror highertank volume, larvae density, or food doses; light privation did not report better results for larval development., The present study was financed by the Caisse d'Epargne Cote d'Azur. We are also grateful to the research crew of the Institut Oceanographique Paul Ricard and the Catholic University of Valencia for their technical support and help collecting and maintaining fan mussels. Special thanks to the reviewers for their constructive and necessary suggestions.

International audience; 1. In recent years, remarkable progress has been made in developing environmental DNA metabarcoding. However, its ability to quantify species relative abundance remains uncertain, limiting its application for biomonitoring. In diatoms, although the rbcL gene appears to be a suitable barcode for diatoms, providing relevant qualitative data to describe taxonomic composition, improvement of species quantifica-tion is still required. 2. Here, we hypothesized that rbcL copy number is correlated with diatom cell biovol-ume (as previously described for the 18S gene) and that a correction factor (CF) based on cell biovolume should be applied to improve taxa quantification. We carried out a laboratory experiment using pure cultures of eight diatom species with contrasted cell biovolumes in order to (1) verify the relationship between rbcL copy numbers (estimated by qPCR) and diatom cell biovolumes and (2) define a potential CF. In order to evaluate CF efficiency, five mock communities were created by mixing different amounts of DNA from the eight species, and were sequenced using HTS and targeting the same rbcL barcode. 3. As expected, the correction of DNA reads proportions by the CF improved the congruence between morphological and molecular inventories. Final validation of the CF was obtained on environmental samples (metabarcoding data from 80 ben-thic biofilms) for which the application of CF allowed differences between molecular and morphological water quality indices to be reduced by 47%. 4. Overall, our results highlight the usefulness of applying a CF factor, which is effective in reducing over-estimation of high biovolume species, correcting quantitative biases in diatom metabarcoding studies and improving final water quality assessment. K E Y W O R D S benthic diatom, biovolume correction factor, freshwater ecosystems, gene copy number variation, quantitative metabarcoding

The Special Committee on Registration of Algal and Plant Names (including fossils) was established at the XVIII International Botanical Congress (IBC) in Melbourne in 2011, its mandate being to consider what would be involved in registering algal and plant names (including fossils), using a procedure analogous to that for fungal names agreed upon in Melbourne and included as Art. 42 in the International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants. Because experience with voluntary registration was key to persuading mycologists of the advantages of mandatory registration, we began by asking institutions with a history of nomenclatural indexing to develop mechanisms that would permit registration. The task proved more difficult than anticipated, but considerable progress has been made, as is described in this report. It also became evident that the Nomenclature Section needs a structure that will allow ongoing discussion of registration and associated issues. Simultaneously with this report we are submitting four proposals that would provide such a structure. Fil: Barkworth, Mary E.. State University of Utah; Estados Unidos Fil: Watson, Mark. Royal Botanic Gardens; Reino Unido Fil: Barrie, Fred R.. Field Museum of National History; Estados Unidos Fil: Belyaeva, Irina V.. Royal Botanic Gardens; Reino Unido Fil: Chung, Richard C. K.. Forest Research Institute Malaysia; Malasia Fil: Dašková, Jiřina. National Museum; República Checa Fil: Davidse, Gerrit. Missouri Botanical Garden; Estados Unidos Fil: Dönmez, Ali A.. Hacettepe Üniversitesi; Turquía Fil: Alexander B. Doweld. National Institute of Carpology; Rusia Fil: Dressler, Stefan. Senckenberg Forschungsinstitut und Naturmuseum; Alemania Fil: Flann, Christina. Naturalis Biodiversity Center; Países Bajos Fil: Gandhi, Kanchi. Harvard University; Estados Unidos Fil: Geltman, Dmitry. Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences; Rusia Fil: Glen, Hugh F.. Forest Hills; Sudáfrica Fil: Greuter, Werner. Freie Universität Berlin; Alemania Fil: Head, Martin J.. Brock University; Canadá Fil: Jahn, Regine. Freie Universität Berlin; Alemania Fil: Janarthanam, Malapati K.. Goa University; India Fil: Katinas, Liliana. Universidad Nacional de La Plata. Facultad de Ciencias Naturales y Museo. División de Plantas Vasculares; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentina Fil: Kirk, Paul M.. Royal Botanic Gardens; Reino Unido Fil: Klazenga, Niels. Royal Botanic Gardens; Australia Fil: Kusber, Wolf Henning. Freie Universität Berlin; Alemania Fil: Kvaček, Jiří. National Museum; República Checa Fil: Malécot, Valéry. Université d’Angers; Francia Fil: Mann, David G.. Royal Botanic Gardens; Reino Unido. Institute for Food and Agricultural Research and Technology; España Fil: Marhold, Karol. Charles University; República Checa Fil: Nagamasu, Hidetoshi. Kyoto University; Japón Fil: Nicolson, Nicky. Royal Botanic Gardens; Reino Unido Fil: Paton, Alan. Royal Botanic Gardens; Reino Unido Fil: Patterson, David J.. University of Sydney; Australia Fil: Price, Michelle J.. Conservatoire et Jardin botaniques de la Ville de Genève; Italia Fil: Prud'homme van Reine, Willem F.. Naturalis Biodiversity Center; Países Bajos Fil: Schneider, Craig W.. Trinity College; Estados Unidos Fil: Sennikov, Alexander. University of Helsinski; Finlandia Fil: Smith, Gideon F.. Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University; Sudáfrica Fil: Stevens, Peter F.. Missouri Botanical Garden; Estados Unidos. University of Missouri-St; Estados Unidos Fil: Yang, Zhu-Liang. Chinese Academy of Sciences; República de China Fil: Zhang, Xian-Chun. Chinese Academy of Sciences; República de China Fil: Zuccarello, Giuseppe C.. Victoria University of Wellington; Nueva Zelanda

International audience; When dividing the ocean, the aim is generally to summarise a complex system into a representative number of units, each representing a specific environment, a biological community or a socio-economical specificity. Recently, several geographical partitions of the global ocean have been proposed using statistical approaches applied to remote sensing or observations gathered during oceanographic cruises. Such geographical frameworks defined at a macroscale appear hardly applicable to characterise the biogeochemical features of semi-enclosed seas that are driven by smaller-scale chemical and physical processes. Following the Longhurst’s biogeochemical partitioning of the pelagic realm, this study investigates the environmental divisions of the Mediterranean Sea using a large set of environmental parameters. These parameters were informed in the horizontal and the vertical dimensions to provide a 3D spatial framework for environmental management (12 regions found for the epipelagic, 12 for the mesopelagic, 13 for the bathypelagic and 26 for the seafloor). We show that: (1) the contribution of the longitudinal environmental gradient to the biogeochemical partitions decreases with depth; (2) the partition of the surface layer cannot be extrapolated to other vertical layers as the partition is driven by a different set of environmental variables. This new partitioning of the Mediterranean Sea has strong implications for conservation as it highlights that management must account for the differences in zoning with depth at a regional scale.

As the world's social-environmental problems increasingly extend across boundaries, both disciplinary and political, there is a growing need for interdisciplinarity, not only in research per se, but also in doctoral education. We present the common pitfalls of interdisciplinary research in doctoral education, illustrating approaches towards solutions using the Nordic Centre for Research on Marine Ecosystems and Resources under Climate Change (NorMER) research network as a case study. We provide insights and detailed examples of how to overcome some of the challenges of conducting interdisciplinary research within doctoral studies that can be applied within any doctoral/postdoctoral education programme, and beyond. Results from a self-evaluation survey indicate that early-career workshops, annual meetings and research visits to other institutions were the most effective learning mechanisms, whereas single discipline-focused courses and coursework were among the least effective learning mechanisms. By identifying the strengths and weaknesses of components of NorMER, this case study can inform the design of future programmes to enhance interdisciplinarity in doctoral education, as well as be applied to science collaboration and academic research in general.

International audience; 1. Diatoms include a great diversity of taxa and are recognized as powerful bioindicators of freshwater quality. However using diatoms for bioassess-ment is costly and time consuming, because most of the indices necessitate species-level identification. Simplifying diatoms-based assessment protocols has focused the attention of water-managers and researchers in recent years. 2. The increasing availability of genomic data and phylogenies can benefit in the development of bioassessment methods making use of these tools, where a clade plays the role of a species if relevant. Indeed, the null hypothesis is that closely related species are more likely to exhibit similar environmental sensitivity because of phylogenetic constraints and inheritance. Such patterns have been reported recently for sensitivity to a variety of pollutants for two important groups of bioindicators used for freshwater monitoring: benthic macroinvertebrates and diatoms. 3. We introduce a method to extract clusters of species sharing similar traits and being phylogenetically related. We apply this method on the general pollution sensitivity (IPS specific sensitivity value; Coste, 1982) of 262 species of diatoms and, by tuning the method settings; we generate different clade-based derivatives of the traditional IPS index. 4. Finally, we estimate traditional and derived IPS scores for 2119 natural communities of diatoms in eastern France to compare and assess the performances of these new indices. 5. Synthesis and applications. We show that phylogenetic approaches offer a scope for simplification without an important loss of information and we discuss the potential of their use in biomonitoring.

This paper puts forward a framework for probabilistic and holistic cost-effectiveness analysis to provide support in selecting the least-cost set of measures to reach a multidimensional environmental objective. Following the principles of ecosystem-based management, the framework includes a flexible methodology for deriving and populating criteria for effectiveness and costs and analyzing complex ecological-economic trade-offs under uncertainty. The framework is applied in the development of the Finnish Programme of Measures (PoM) for reaching the targets of the EU Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD). The numerical results demonstrate that substantial cost savings can be realized from careful consideration of the costs and multiple effects of management measures. If adopted, the proposed PoM would yield improvements in the state of the Baltic Sea, but the overall objective of the MSFD would not be reached by the target year of 2020; for various environmental and administrative reasons, it would take longer for most measures to take full effect.

The purpose of this study was to examine the impacts of anthropogenic activity on the health status of intertidal clam populations of the Saguenay Fjord and the St. Lawrence Estuary (Québec, Canada). Clams were collected during low tide at sites subject to direct contamination and at sites far from human activity. Clams were analyzed for tributyltin and dibutyltin total levels and toxic stress (glutathione S-transferase, gonadal lipid peroxidation and DNA strand breaks), immunocompetence (phagocytic activity, hemocyte count and viability), reproduction (gonado-somatic index, gamete maturation, and vitellogenin-like proteins), energy status (temperature-dependent mitochondrial electron transport, and gonad lipids), and individual status (age, condition factor, and growth index). These responses were compared against population characteristics such as live clam density, number of empty shells, and sex ratio. The results show that clam density decreased with distance from the estuary (high salinity level) to upstream of the fjord (low salinity). There was no clear relationship between the number of empty shells and distance or site quality. Clam density values corrected against distance were significantly correlated with hemocyte viability, phagocytic activity, mitochondrial electron transport (MET), DNA damage in gonad, and temperature-dependent mitochondrial electron transport activity. A canonical analysis of the various groups of biomarkers revealed that population metrics were more strongly related with immunocompetence, followed by energy status and temperature-dependent mitochondrial electron transport activity. However, toxic stress biomarkers were strongly associated with energy status and reproduction. This was further confirmed by non-linear modeling using adaptive artificial neural networks (genetic selection and back propagation learning paradigms), where the following parameters were able to predict population parameters with

International audience; Previous microscopy-based studies in the eastern English Channel have revealed it to be a productive meso-eutrophic coastal ecosystem, characterized by strong repeating patterns in microplankton succession. The present study examines the seasonal structure of the entire protistan community from March 2011 to July 2013, using tag pyrosequencing of the V2-V3 hypervariable region of the 18S rRNA gene. A total of 1242 OTUs and 28 high-level taxonomic groups, which included previously undetected taxa in the area, were identified. The detected OTUs were considered according to taxon-specific traits, which included their trophic role, abundance and specialization level. Taxa differentiation based on specialization level rather than abundance was more informative in describing community organization. While generalists were always abundant, numerous specialists that were either rare or absent in most samples, increased in abundance for short periods, appearing to be overall abundant. Statistical and network analyses showed that the protistan seasonal organization was influenced by environmental parameters. It also highlighted that in addition to grazers, fungi and parasites played potentially significant roles during phytoplankton blooms. Overall, while the protistan succession was mainly shaped by environmental variations, biotic interactions among co-occurring taxa were the main structural drivers of the temporal assemblages.

The management of internationally shared fish stocks is a major economic, environmental and political issue. According to international law, these resources should be managed cooperatively under international fisheries agreements (IFAs). This paper studies the formation and stability of IFAs through a coalition game that accounts for both direct consumptive values (harvesting profits) and non-consumptive values of the fish stock per se. The results show that accounting for non-consumptive values helps conserve the fish stock in that equilibrium fishing efforts are smaller and fish stock larger than without non-consumptive values under all possible coalition scenarios (full, partial and no cooperation). However, considering non-consumptive values does not affect the outcome of the game in terms of the prospects for cooperation: even with substantial non-consumptive benefits, the outcome is full non-cooperation. Hence, the trap of non-cooperation in international fisheries management cannot be overcome simply by explicitly accounting for non-consumptive values within IFAs. It is suggested that strengthening the role of IFAs and limiting the ability of non-member countries to free-ride be further investigated as measures fostering cooperation.

We analyze dynamically optimal eutrophication management using two controls, targeted fishing and reduction of external nutrient loads. Fishing removes nutrients from the water ecosystem, and the size of the fish stock also influences eutrophication through food web effects and other mechanisms. We show that fisheries have a role to play in cost-efficient water quality management in combination with external load reductions. Our numerical application considers phosphorus driven eutrophication, agricultural phosphorus abatement and fisheries targeted on cyprinids on a coastal bay in the Baltic Sea. The socially and privately optimal intensity of fishing efforts, phosphorus abatement and the resulting water quality are influenced by damages, revenues and costs. Furthermore, we show that the link between cyprinid fish stock and water quality, and the form of the fishing industry — sole owner or open access — have joint dynamics that lead to very different outcomes. A weak link between cyprinid stock and water quality is associated with socially optimal stock close to its maximum sustainable yield. This maximizes phosphorus removal. With a strong link, socially optimal stock and phosphorus removal are low. Coincidentally, open-access fishing sometimes yields socially desirable outcome automatically — a market failure in industry structure may counteract eutrophication.

International audience; Models for predicting the fate of micropollutants (MPs) in wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) have been developed to provide engineers and decision-makers with tools that they can use to improve their understanding of, and evaluate how to optimize, the removal of MPs and determine their impact on the receiving waters. This paper provides an overview of such models, and discusses the impact of regulation, engineering practice and research on model development. A review of the current status of MP models reveals that a single model cannot represent the wide range of MPs that are present in wastewaters today, and that it is important to start considering classes of MPs based on their chemical structure or ecotoxicological effect, rather than the individual molecules. This paper identifies potential future research areas that comprise (i) considering transformation products in MP removal analysis, (ii) addressing advancements in WWTP treatment technologies, (iii) making use of common approaches to data acquisition for model calibration and (iv) integrating ecotoxicological effects of MPs in receiving waters.