Uncovering the Mediterranean Salt Giant (MEDSALT) - Scientific Networking as Incubator of Cross-disciplinary Research in Earth Sciences

2019 ◽  
Vol 28 (1) ◽  
pp. 40-61 ◽  
Author(s):  
Angelo Camerlenghi ◽  
Vanni Aloisi
Keyword(s):  
Scientific Controversy ◽  
European Cooperation ◽  
The Earth ◽  
Salt Layer ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Mediterranean ◽  
European Training ◽  
The Mediterranean Basin ◽  
Seawater Exchange

About 6 million years ago, the Mediterranean basin was the location of one of the most extraordinary events in the recent geological history of the Earth: the Messinian Salinity Crisis. Restriction of the seawater exchange between the Atlantic and the Mediterranean led to excess evaporation and deposition on the bottom of the deep Mediterranean basins of a 1.5 km-thick salt layer. Research on this event initiated a long-term scientific controversy. COST (European Cooperation in Science and Technology) and Marie Skłodowska-Curie European Training Networks were identified as the most appropriate tools to address and solve the controversy using a highly cross-disciplinary approach.

scholarly journals Extensive introgression and mosaic genomes of Mediterranean endemic lizards

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Weizhao Yang ◽  
Nathalie Feiner ◽  
Catarina Pinho ◽  
Geoffrey M. While ◽  
Antigoni Kaliontzopoulou ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Evolutionary History ◽  
Mediterranean Islands ◽  
The Past ◽  
Island Endemics ◽  
Extant Species ◽  
Mediterranean Island ◽  
History Of ◽  
Entire History ◽  
The Mediterranean ◽  
The Mediterranean Basin

AbstractThe Mediterranean basin is a hotspot of biodiversity, fuelled by climatic oscillation and geological change over the past 20 million years. Wall lizards of the genus Podarcis are among the most abundant, diverse, and conspicuous Mediterranean fauna. Here, we unravel the remarkably entangled evolutionary history of wall lizards by sequencing genomes of 34 major lineages covering 26 species. We demonstrate an early (>11 MYA) separation into two clades centred on the Iberian and Balkan Peninsulas, and two clades of Mediterranean island endemics. Diversification within these clades was pronounced between 6.5–4.0 MYA, a period spanning the Messinian Salinity Crisis, during which the Mediterranean Sea nearly dried up before rapidly refilling. However, genetic exchange between lineages has been a pervasive feature throughout the entire history of wall lizards. This has resulted in a highly reticulated pattern of evolution across the group, characterised by mosaic genomes with major contributions from two or more parental taxa. These hybrid lineages gave rise to several of the extant species that are endemic to Mediterranean islands. The mosaic genomes of island endemics may have promoted their extraordinary adaptability and striking diversity in body size, shape and colouration, which have puzzled biologists for centuries.

scholarly journals Evidence for long‐term prevalence of cucumber vein yellowing virus in Sudan and genetic variation of the virus in Sudan and the Mediterranean Basin

2019 ◽  
Vol 68 (7) ◽  
pp. 1268-1275 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. Desbiez ◽  
P. Caciagli ◽  
C. Wipf‐Scheibel ◽  
P. Millot ◽  
L. Ruiz ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Genetic Variation ◽  
Mediterranean Basin ◽  
The Mediterranean ◽  
The Mediterranean Basin ◽  
Yellowing Virus

Wanted: A Comparative History of the Modern Mediterranean

2012 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
pp. 47-53
Author(s):  
Edmund Burke
Keyword(s):  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Third World ◽  
Dominant Role ◽  
The West ◽  
The Third ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Mediterranean ◽  
The Third World

There is something seriously flawed about models of social change that posit the dominant role of in-built civilizational motors. While “the rise of the West” makes great ideology, it is poor history. Like Jared Diamond, I believe that we need to situate the fate of nations in a long-term ecohistorical context. Unlike Diamond, I believe that the ways (and the sequences) in which things happened mattered deeply to what came next. The Mediterranean is a particularly useful case in this light. No longer a center of progress after the sixteenth century, the decline of the Mediterranean is usually ascribed to its inherent cultural deficiencies. While the specific cultural infirmity varies with the historian (amoral familism, patron/clientalism, and religion are some of the favorites) its civilizationalist presuppositions are clear. In this respect the search for “what went wrong” typifies national histories across the region and prefigures the fate of the Third World.

scholarly journals New historical data for long-term swordfish ecological studies in the Mediterranean Sea

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (12) ◽  
pp. 5867-5877
Author(s):  
Brian R. MacKenzie ◽  
Teresa Romeo ◽  
Piero Addis ◽  
Pietro Battaglia ◽  
Pierpaolo Consoli ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Mediterranean Sea ◽  
Fishery Management ◽  
Data Availability ◽  
Knowledge Based ◽  
Time Period ◽  
Before And After ◽  
Trap Fishery ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Mediterranean

Abstract. Management of marine fisheries and ecosystems is constrained by knowledge based on datasets with limited temporal coverage. Many populations and ecosystems were perturbed long before scientific investigations began. This situation is particularly acute for the largest and commercially most valuable species. We hypothesized that historical trap fishery records for bluefin tuna (Thunnus thynnus Linnaeus, 1758) could contain catch data and information for other, bycatch species, such as swordfish (Xiphias gladius Linnaeus, 1758). This species has a long history of exploitation and is presently overexploited, yet indicators of its status (biomass) used in fishery management only start in 1950. Here we examine historical fishery records and logbooks from some of these traps and recovered ca. 110 years of bycatch data (1896–2010). These previously neglected, but now recovered, data include catch dates and amounts in numbers and/or weights (including individual weights) for the time period before and after major expansion of swordfish fisheries in the Mediterranean Sea. New historical datasets such as these could help understand how human activities and natural variability interact to affect the long-term dynamics of this species. The datasets are online and available with open access via three DOIs, as described in the “Data availability” section of the article.

Bluetongue in Europe and the Mediterranean Basin: History of occurrence prior to 2006

2008 ◽  
Vol 87 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 4-20 ◽  
Author(s):  
Philip S. Mellor ◽  
Simon Carpenter ◽  
Lara Harrup ◽  
Matthew Baylis ◽  
Peter P.C. Mertens
Keyword(s):  
Mediterranean Basin ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Mediterranean ◽  
The Mediterranean Basin

scholarly journals Long-Term Yields of Switchgrass, Giant Reed, and Miscanthus in the Mediterranean Basin

2015 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 1492-1499 ◽  
Author(s):  
Efthymia Alexopoulou ◽  
Federica Zanetti ◽  
Danilo Scordia ◽  
Walter Zegada-Lizarazu ◽  
Myrsini Christou ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Mediterranean Basin ◽  
Giant Reed ◽  
The Mediterranean ◽  
The Mediterranean Basin

scholarly journals The Iberian Peninsula’s Burning Heart—Long-Term Fire History in the Toledo Mountains (Central Spain)

Fire ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 2 (4) ◽  
pp. 54
Author(s):  
Luelmo-Lautenschlaeger ◽  
Blarquez ◽  
Pérez-Díaz ◽  
Morales-Molino ◽  
López-Sáez
Keyword(s):  
Land Use ◽  
Mediterranean Basin ◽  
Fire Regimes ◽  
Nature Management ◽  
Central Spain ◽  
Fire Activity ◽  
The Mediterranean ◽  
In Fire ◽  
The Mediterranean Basin

Long-term fire ecology can help to better understand the major role played by fire in driving vegetation composition and structure over decadal to millennial timescales, along with climate change and human agency, especially in fire-prone areas such as the Mediterranean basin. Investigating past ecosystem dynamics in response to changing fire activity, climate, and land use, and how these landscape drivers interact in the long-term is needed for efficient nature management, protection, and restoration. The Toledo Mountains of central Spain are a mid-elevation mountain complex with scarce current anthropic intervention located on the westernmost edge of the Mediterranean basin. These features provide a perfect setting to study patterns of late Holocene fire activity and landscape transformation. Here, we have combined macroscopic charcoal analysis with palynological data in three peat sequences (El Perro, Brezoso, and Viñuelas mires) to reconstruct fire regimes during recent millennia and their linkages to changes in vegetation, land use, and climatic conditions. During a first phase (5000–3000 cal. BP) characterized by mixed oak woodlands and low anthropogenic impact, climate exerted an evident influence over fire regimes. Later, the data show two phases of increasing human influence dated at 3000–500 cal. BP and 500 cal. BP–present, which translated into significant changes in fire regimes increasingly driven by human activity. These results contribute to prove how fire regimes have changed along with human societies, being more related to land use and less dependent on climatic cycles.

scholarly journals The Italian genome reflects the history of Europe and the Mediterranean basin

2015 ◽  
Vol 24 (7) ◽  
pp. 1056-1062 ◽  
Author(s):  
Giovanni Fiorito ◽  
Cornelia Di Gaetano ◽  
Simonetta Guarrera ◽  
Fabio Rosa ◽  
Marcus W Feldman ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Mediterranean Basin ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Mediterranean ◽  
History Of Europe ◽  
The Mediterranean Basin
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