Description: This is the first volume of the entirely rewritten, revised and updated version of the original FAO Catalogue of Cephalopods of the World (1984). The present Volume is a multiauthored compilation that reviews six families: Nautilidae, Sepiidae, Sepiolidae, Sepiadariidae, Idiosepiidae and Spirulidae, with 23 genera and the 201 species known to the date of the completion of the volume. It provides accounts for all families and genera, as well as illustrated keys to all taxa. Information under each species account includes: valid modern systematic name and original citation of the species (or subspecies); main synonyms; English, French and Spanish FAO names for the species; illustrations of dorsal and ventral aspect of the whole animal (as necessary) and other distinguishing illustrations; field characteristics; diagnostic features; geographic and vertical distribution, including GIS map; size; habitat; biology; interest to fishery; local names when available; a remarks section (as necess ary) and literature. The volume is fully indexed and also includes sections on terminology and measurements, an extensive glossary, an introduction with an updated review of the existing biological knowledge on cephalopods (including fisheries information and catch data for recent years) and a dedicated bibliography.

Description: BASEWECS is a contribution to the German Climate Research Program DEKLIM. The project started in May 2001 and lasted until December 2004. BASEWECS aimed at the investigation of the influence of the Baltic Sea and its annual ice coverage on the water and energy budget of the BALTEX area

Description: A flow-injection (FI)-based instrument under Lab VIEW control for monitoring iron in marine waters is described. The instrument incorporates a miniature, low-power photomultiplier tube (PMT), and a number of microelectric and solenoid actuated valves and peristaltic pumps. The software allows full control of all flow injection components and processing of the data from the PMT. The optimised system is capable of 20 injections per hour, including preconcentration and wash steps. The detection limit (3 sd of the blank) is 21 pM at sea and the linear range is 21-2000 pM with a 60-second sample load time. Typical precision between replicate FI peaks is 5.9 ± 3.2 (n = 4) over the linear range. © 2005 Hindawi Publishing Corporation.

Description: This study explores life-history strategies of recent fishes based on a data set that is two orders of magnitude larger than those used in previous studies. Trophic level, size and productivity were taken as key traits and proxies for many other closely related traits. Size was strongly correlated with most life-history traits of fishes and also with morphological characters, behaviour, and preferred environmental conditions. Size was also a good predictor of placement on the r-K continuum. Productivity was derived from growth, age at maturity, maximum age, and fecundity data. It was positively correlated with metabolism and level of activity and was also an indicator for placement of species on the r-K continuum. It was strongly correlated with most life-history traits of fishes and also with morphological characters, behaviour, and preferred environmental conditions. It was negatively correlated with status of threat. The position of species in the food web was shown to restrict life-history options. The addition of trophic level as an orthogonal axis on the r-K continuum revealed unoccupied regions such as the combination of small size and high productivity with either herbivory or top-predatory, and the combination of very large size and very low productivity with herbivory. Discrete classes of size, trophic level and productivity were used to define 80 life history strategies. Only 50 of these strategies were used by recent species, with an exponential decline in species’ numbers from the most to the least used strategies. This decline is interpreted as an exponential increase in constraints associated with less-used strategies. Analysis of trade-off or constraint curves in life-history space revealed unoccupied areas as well as local maxima, i.e., areas occupied by more species than the surrounding space. Such a local optimum was occupied by very large top predators with very low productivity. Low-level predators of small to medium size and medium to high productivity were the three strategies used by altogether 60% of the species. Strategies used in extreme environments such as the deep and polar seas or high-altitude lakes were not ‘specialist strategies’ but rather among the 10 most-used strategies, suggesting that constraints imposed by extreme environments excluded strategies that had a high degree of inherent constraints. The number of strategies used by phylogenetic, environmental, morphological or behavioural groupings of fishes was highly predictable from the number of species in the respective groups. A preliminary chronology of life-history strategies showed that over 2/3 of recent strategies were invented only 200-150 million years ago during several radiations of the Actinopterygii, including small size, very large size (invented in parallel by Elasmobranchii), high productivity, and true herbivory. Phylogeny restricted the life-history options available to species with respect to size, place in the food web and productivity. There was evidence for a non-overlap of preferred life-history strategies between the two largest recent Classes, with Elasmobranchii tending towards large size and low to very low productivity, and Actinopterygii tending towards medium size with medium to high productivity. Nine selection theories were tested as to their ability to correctly predict adaptation of life-history traits in response to environmental conditions such as salinity, climate, zoogeographic realm, ocean basin, and habitat type. Predictions were 88 – 100% correct when cases where different theories predicted different adaptations were excluded. In conflicting cases, predictions by temperature theory usually prevailed over those by r-K and succession theories. Life-history strategies were examined with respect to their correlations with body shape, brain size, reproductive guild, migratory behaviour and status of threat. Productivity increased with body shape from eel-like to short and/or deep, with brain size from very small to normal and large, and with migratory behaviour from catadromous to amphidromous and non-migratory. Size decreased with migratory behaviour from catadromous to non-migratory, and with parental care from nonguarders to bearers (in Actinopterygii). Trophic level decreased with increase in brain size. Several life-history strategies were only used by migratory species. Non-threatened fishes had significantly higher productivity than threatened fishes. Life history-strategies that combined large size and low productivity contained proportionally more threatened species than other strategies. Independent estimates of abundance and distributional range of species were used as indicators of success of life-history strategies. Species showed preferences for strategies that were associated with high abundance or small to medium ranges. When abundance and range were combined into a single measure of success (Impact), most strategies were associated with impacts that were not significantly different from the overall mean. Only medium-sized low-level predators and omnivores with high productivity had significantly higher impact; these two strategies were used by 39% of the species.