Sturgeons (Order Acipenseriformes) represent an extremely valuable natural resource that is now facing depletion. In the current study we evaluate if the traditional classification in subspecies of Acipenser gueldenstaedtii, Acipenser stellatus and Huso huso, endemic to Ponto-Caspian region is sustained by molecular analysis and if these represent Evolutionary Significant Units (ESUs) that shou...

Hepcidin is known to be expressed in fish with bacterial challenge and iron overload. Here we first report the hepcidin expression induced in the developmental stages from embryo to fry of red sea bream (Pagarus major) and in juvenile black porgy (Acanthopagrus schlegelii B.) upon continuous waterborne exposure to BaP. The gene expression of CYP1A1 and IgL (immunoglobulin light chain) were both...

The source of human infection with intestinal flukes was surveyed in estuarine fishes, including the dotted gizzard shad, common sea bass, common blackish goby, redlip mullet, black sea bream, and oyster collected from Muan-gun, Jeollanam-do, Korea during August and September 2007. Collected fishes and oysters were artificially digested in pepsin-HCl solution and examined under a stereomicrosco...

In this Letter we have derived the gravitational anomaly leading to the Hawking radiation from a fundamentally different perspective: it emerges due to the complimentary roles played by tunneling and (gravitational) anomaly. We have used the analogy of an early idea [6] of visualizing chiral gauge anomaly as an effect of spectral flow of the energy levels, from the negative energy Dirac sea, ac...

Sector field ICP-MS has been used to determine 239+240 Pu activity and 240 Pu/ 239 Pu atom ratio profiles in a sediment core obtained in 1997 from the Danube Delta region of the Black Sea. The 239+240 Pu activity profile reveals the presence of a 1963 stratospheric fallout peak, along with two more recent peaks stemming from fluvial transport of Chernobyl Pu through the Danube watershed into th...

Leiopathes glaberrima is a tall arborescent black coral species structuring important facies of the deep-sea rocky bottoms of the Mediterranean Sea that are severely stifled by fishing activities. At present, however, no morphological in vivo description, ecological characterization, age dating and evaluation of the possible conservation actions have ever been made for any population of this sp...

Freshwater and brackish species of bryozoans belong to the Phylactolaemata and Gymnolaemata class. Twelve species of bryozoans were recorded and morphologically determined at eight locations in the Black Sea and the Adriatic basin in Croatia. Twelve species of Bryozoa have been listed in the taxonomic index for Croatia (Conopeum seurati, Lophopus crystallinus Paludicella articulata, Cristatella...

A one-dimensional coupled physical–ecosystem model identifies factors causing blooms of the coccolithophore Emilania huxleyi in the Black Sea, regularly observed during the early summer periods. The model specifically applies for a more idealized ecosystem of the interior basin, away from the coastal zone. It is represented in the form of four groups of phytoplankton (diatoms, dinoflagellates, ...

Alteromonas macleodii is a marine gammaproteobacterium with widespread distribution in temperate or tropical waters. We describe three genomes of isolates from surface waters around Europe (Atlantic, Mediterranean and Black Sea) and compare them with a previously described deep Mediterranean isolate (AltDE) that belongs to a widely divergent clade. The surface isolates are quite similar, the mo...