Utilizzo di sistemi di valutazione della qualità costiera della Cirenaica (Jamahiriya Libya - Mediterraneo sud orientale) mediante indicatori derivati dall\u27ecologia del paesaggio

Utilization of evaluation systems concerning coastal quality of cyrenaica (Jamahiriya Libya - south eastern Mediterranean sea) through landscape ecology indicator

First Description of the Sound Pressure and Particle Velocity Components of the Ambient Noise and Boat Noise Recorded at the WWF-Miramare Natural Marine Reserve, Trieste, Italy

A growing body of scientific evidence shows that the increasing noise pollution in coastal environments due to human activities has detrimental effects on marine animals, including many endangered species. As a consequence, research studies and subsequent conservational actions are needed to mitigate the effects of noise pollution. One important step is to safeguard sensitive areas known as marine protected areas (MPAs) from anthropogenic noise; these ecologically rich areas, critical habitats for key species, are often located in highly populated coastal zones. This is the case of the WWF-Miramare Natural Marine Reserve, a UNESCO-Man and Biosphere Programme (MAB) Biosphere Reserve located in the Gulf of Trieste (Italy) and considered an important seasonal nursery area in the North Adriatic Sea (Guidetti et al. 2005). Although a recent study (Codarin et al. 2008), based on daytime acoustic monitoring, shows that the Miramare fish population is living in a heavily noisy underwater environment year-round, relatively little is known about the features and anthropogenic factors of nocturnal sea ambient noise (SAN) in the Reserve. This information is particularly relevant considering that intraspecific communication of many marine species (i.e., the brown meager, Sciaena umbra, during spawning season; Bonacito et al. 2001) occurs after sunset and during night. As a consequence, the present study aims 1) to quantify the nocturnal ambient noise levels at the Reserve, 2) to distinguish and quantify the biological versus anthropogenic components of the noise, and 3) to discuss their possible interaction

First description of the sound pressure and particle velocity components of the ambient noise and boat noise recorded at the WWF- Miramare Natural Marine Reserve (Trieste, Italy)

The underwater acoustic background noise, and the noise produced by a small outboard-engine boat moving at 6 knots, were recorded in the core zone WWF-Natural Marine Reserve of Miramare waters (Trieste, Italy), an area in which fish density is high, by using a tetrahedron-shaped 4-channels hydrophonic probe placed on the sea bottom. For the first time, a new 4-channels recording system was employed (“Soundfish”), capable of storing on an SD card, in standard WAV format, the signals coming from the 4 hydrophones. The collected data have been analyzed by means of the Brahmavolver software, a modification of the software initially developed for Brahma, a 4-channels recorder system developed for aerial applications. As result, vectorial decomposition of the sound field was obtained, containing a set of 4 signals, corresponding the 0th and 1st order spherical harmonics of the sound pressure field. In practice, the 0th-order components is the sound pressure, and the three first-order components are the three Cartesian components of the particle velocity. Hence, the instantaneous Sound Intensity vector can be computed, from which the three-dimensional direction-of-arrival of the sound can be obtained, and the position of the predominant noise source can be tracked continuously. A graphical tool such as Surfer ™, was used for charting the vectorial information over a marine map of the area, evidencing the estimated position of the sound source at every instant. This allowed for the construction of the trajectory of a moving sound source, such as a boat. This data can be employed for an analysis of the cause-effect relationship, as at every instant the position of the source, relative to the receiver, is known. The paper provides a detailed description of the Soundfish recorder, presents the result of a preliminary test of its angular accuracy obtained by experiments conducted inside a large test pool on a automated turntable, explains the mathematical and physical details of the signal processing performed by Brahmavolver, and presents the analysis of the recordings collected at the Miramare Reserve, showing the estimated iso-level contour maps of the boat passages, and, for the first time, statistics about the spatial properties of the sea background noise. It is also planned to employ the multichannel recordings for making in-air or in-pool playback of the recorded sound, employing a 3D surround loudspeaker system (working following the principle of th Ambisonics method), in order to reproduce the underwater acoustical spatial soundscape recorded in the field, something actually impossible to obtain from mono recordings containing just the sound pressure information

Considerations on a population of the endangered marine mollusc Patella ferruginea Gmelin, 1791 (Gastropoda, Patellidae) in the Cala Iris islet (National Park of Al Hoceima - Morocco, Alboran sea)

Volume: 40Start Page: 95End Page: 10

The Ecological Observing System of the Adriatic Sea (ECOAdS): structure and perspectives within the main European biodiversity and environmental strategies

This Policy Brief succinctly presents the Ecological Observing System of the Adriatic Sea (ECOAdS), aimed at integrating the ecological and oceanographic dimensions within the conservation strategy of the Natura 2000 network, and to propose a way to go for its future development and maintenance. After a definition of marine ecological observatories, we describe the current structure of ECOAdS, its key components and potential relevance in relation to the main European strategies for biodiversity and marine observation for the next decade. Finally, we suggest some actions that could be undertaken for the future development of ECOAdS, targeting possible perspectives in different regional, macro-regional, national and European strategic contexts. This Policy Brief is one of the outcomes of the Interreg Italy-Croatia Project ECOSS (ECological Observing System in the Adriatic Sea: oceanographic observations for biodiversity; https://www.italy-croatia.eu/web/ecoss), which had the main purpose to design and carry out the first steps for the establishment of ECOAdS