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More than two third of the surface area of our planet is covered by oceans and assessment of the marine biodiversity is a challenging task. With the increasing global population, there is a tendency to exploit marine recourses for food, energy and other requirements. This puts pressure on the fragile marine environment and needs sustainable conservation efforts. Marine species identification using traditional taxonomical methods are often burdened with taxonomic controversies. Here in this book we will discuss the comparatively new concept of DNA barcoding and its significance in marine perspective. This molecular technique can be helpful in the assessment of crypticspecies which are widespread in marine environment, and can also be used to link the different life cycle stages to the adult which is difficult to accomplish in marine ecosystems. Other advantages of DNA barcoding include authentication and safety assessment of seafood, wildlife forensics, conservation genetics and detection of invasive alien species (IAS). Global DNA barcoding efforts in the marine habitat include MarBOL, CeDAMar, CMarZ, SHARK-BOL, etc. DNA barcoding of different marine groups ranging from the microbes to mammals is to be revealed. In conjugation with newer and faster techniques like high throughput sequencing, DNA barcoding is serving as an effective modern tool in marine biodiversity assessment and conservation.

Written by an international team of experts from the Tara Oceans Marine Biology Imaging Platform (TAOMI), this is the first and only compendium on marine imaging technologies, and includes all known underwater as well as on-land techniques. TAOMI is imaging the largest collection of marine organisms in recent history, ranging from viruses to corals, and is duplicated on land to perform high throughput confocal analysis of plankton, X-ray tomography as well as cryo-electron microscopy. This unique platform combines underwater imaging with cytometry, stereomicroscopy, fluorescence microscopy and 3D microscopy - all of which are covered in this practical book, along with remote sensing, MRI, and optical projection tomography. The definitive resource for every marine biologist who is planning to image marine species, whether underwater or on land.