Study Areas

1.Gibraltar Strait and Alboran Sea exchange

New time-series of the evolution of hydrological structures will be collected, using satellite data, ADCP mooring, field surveys and implementation of new sampling technologies such as gliders for near real time characterization of the flow structures and more precisely eastward jet definition.

2.North Western Mediterranean shelf ecosystem

In order to investigate the basic coastal ecosystem structure, including the cycling and export of carbon, data will be gathered at various levels of the food web. Physical and biogeochemical variables will be collected by multi-instrumented platforms and innovative instruments such as the underwater video profiler (UVP). The measurements near the river mouth, in the water column and sediment-water interface (e.g. turbidity, TOC, TON, POM, PON, bacterial biomass and diversity, fluorescence, chlorophyll a, 13C, 15N, O2 consumption, nutrient release, macrofauna, meiofauna etc.) will contribute to the understanding of coastal ecosystem functioning. Benthic-pelagic coupling, cycling and export of carbon, energy budgets and the impact of river inputs (particularly the effects of extreme events -floods and storms) on the functioning of the pelagic and benthic coastal systems, will also be assessed.

3.Sicily Strait exchange

Three multidisciplinary cruises along a transect from Tunisia to Sicily will provide CTD, nutrients, chlorophyll, phytoplankton, zooplankton and ichthyoplankton data. Three current-meter moorings along the western sill of the Sicily Straits will permit continuous monitoring of the surface and the deep currents for one year. The transport of water mass, heat and salt through the Strait will be estimated together with information on the nutrient budget. An integrated analysis between in situ and satellite data will permit the investigation of regional and large scale forcings together with mesoscale features influencing the inter-basin exchanges.

4.Eastern Mediterranean shelf ecosystem

Data collected on the physical and biochemical ecosystem variables along the Turkish (Cilician basin) stations network, Lebanese (high resolution glider surveys) and Israeli coasts (stations on Haifa section) of the eastern Levantine Basin will enable the study of functioning of this largely oligotrophic pelagic ecosystem, the cycling and export of carbon and the effects of the circulation on the dynamics of the ecosystem. The oceanographic stations will cover CTD, ADCP, nutrients, DO, plankton and Chl-a measurements, as well as POM and DOM (Cilician Basin and Haifa section) and DOP (Haifa section), while the glider sections will also collect optical and CDOM data in addition to T, S, DO and Chl-a measurements.

5.Turkish Straits System and Northern Aegean Sea exchange

Data collection on CTD, nutrients, oxygen, size fractioned chlorophyll a, primary production and phytoplankton, bacterial abundance, protozoans, micro and mesozooplankton, DOM and POM, total alkalinity and DIC, pCO2, laboratory determinations of rates, radiotracer studies and analyses of mixing based on fine resolution hydrographic data will be performed.

6.North Western Black Sea shelf ecosystem

Nutrient budgets and transfer, the role of pelagic-benthic interaction in eutrophication and carbon sequestration and the temporal trends and resilience of the western Black Sea ecosystem will be assessed. Sampling cruises will be organized twice a year with physico-chemical measurements (Secchi disk, T, S, DO, nutrients) and biological parameters (Chl-a, phytoplankton, zooplankton and macrozoobenthos). For the biological samples total biomass and species composition will be estimated. In addition element cycling in the sediments will be studied with respect to redox changes and temperature rise, potentially leading to accumulation and release of nutrients, hence eutrophication. Carbon cycling, production rates and fluxes across the sediment-water interface will be studied in sediments of the Danube subaqueous delta. Sediment accumulation and burial rates of organic and inorganic carbon and biogenic silica will also be estimated, using radiotracer measurements.

7.North Eastern Black Sea shelf ecosystem

Physical, chemical and biological data will be collected in the north eastern Black Sea along transects extending offshore from the Caucasian Black Sea coast during seasonal sea-going surveys. Monitoring and assessment of seasonal and interannual variations in bacterio-, phyto-, mesozoo-, and gelatinous plankton, pelagic and benthic fish species will be focused on the function of the shelf ecosystem and its dependence on river runoff and shelf-deep sea exchange. In addition chemical (D?, nutrients, total P, total N and H2S) and physical parameters (T, S, geostrophic current velocity) will be determined. Ship-borne data as well as satellite information on mesoscale circulation, affecting shelf-deep sea exchanges, will be collected and analysed in relation to seasonal and interannual changes in wind forcing and river runoff.