Meiobenthic groups within the World Register of Marine Species

The aim of a World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS) is to provide an authoritative and comprehensive list of names of marine organisms, including information on synonymy. While the highest priority goes to valid names, other names in use are included so that this register can serve as a guide to interpret taxonomic literature. Next to taxonomy, the system can also store distribution information, literature, attributes or traits, specimen information including type localities and images

Report of the Biological Data Products Workshop of the European Marine Observation and Data Network (EMODnet)

From 25 till 26 of February 2010, the Flanders Marine Institute (VLIZ) organized a workshop on biological data products in Oostende, Belgium. This workshop was organized within the framework of the upcoming European Marine Observation and Data Network, EMODnet, launched by the Maritime Policy of the European Commission. 57 participants from 42 excellent institutes involved in marine biological data collection, marine research and marine policy across Europe attended the workshop. The workshop had three main objectives: (1) to discuss the marine biological data availability and gaps in Europe, (2) to demonstrate the prototype of the EMODnet biological data portal to different user groups and (3) to define a set of derived biological data products relevant for private bodies, public authorities and researchers. A huge amount of reliable European marine biological data and information was presented to the public. These data are available and despite some temporal, spatial and taxonomic limitations, data are already very useful for analyses. There was a consensus amongst workshop participants that the look and feel and functionalities of the EMODnet biological prototype portal, visualizing both data observations and data products, were meeting the requirements. Although the user groups were very diverse, being people from the scientific community, people involved in the European marine policy and coastal and marine practitioners, a number of striking similarities amongst data products were found. In the different user discussion groups, four different sets of marine biological data products were identified as priority biological data products being: (1) species distribution maps and trends, (2) species sensitivity and vulnerability maps, (3) species attributes (functional groups, HAB’s, invasive species, red list or protected species) and (4) biodiversity indices. Within the biological EMODnet preparatory action, a few data analysis workshops will be organized in the near future (2011) to produce some of the data products identified during this workshop. The same community and other relevant stakeholders, identified during the meeting will be involved in this process

Aristotle’s scientific contributions to the classification, nomenclature and distribution of marine organisms

The biological works of the Greek philosopher Aristotle include a significant amount of information on marine animals. This study is an overview of Aristotle’s scientific contribution to the knowledge of marine biodiversity and specifically to taxonomic classification, nomenclature and distribution of marine species. Our results show that Aristotle’s approach looks remarkably familiar to present day marine biologists since: (i) although not directly aiming at it, he gave a taxonomic classification of marine animals, which includes physical groups ranked on three levels at least; (ii) most of Aristotle’s marine “major groups” correspond to taxa of the order rank in Linnaeus’s classification and to taxa of the class rank in the current classification; (iii) a positive correlation was found between the number of taxa per group identified in Aristotle’s writings and those described by Linnaeus; (iv) Aristotle’s classification system exhibits similarities with the current one regarding the way taxa are distributed to higher categories; (v) a considerable number of Aristotle’s marine animal names have been used for the creation of the scientific names currently in use; (vi) he was the first to give an account of Mediterranean marine fauna, focusing on the Aegean Sea and adjacent areas. In view of the above, we suggest that the foundations of marine taxonomy as laid down by Aristotle are still echoing today

Europese duurzaamheidsindicatoren voor kustgebieden in Nederland: een eerste inventarisatie = European sustainability indicators for coastal zones in The Netherlands: a first inventory

The Directorate-General Water of the Dutch Ministry of Public Works and Water Management has appointed the National Institute for Coastal and Marine Management (RIKZ) and Flanders Marine Institute (VLIZ) to draw up an inventory of the ED sustainability indicators for its coasts. This document provides a first assessment of sustainability in our coastal zone from a common European point of view. It depicts the findings for the 27 EU sustainability indicators supported by a brief trend analysis where feasible