Adriana Giangrande

• Associate Professor in Zoology
• Professor at University of Salento

Sponges are benthic filter-feeder invertebrates capable to produce a variety of high value bioactive compounds. Nevertheless, exploitation of sponges as bio-factories requires scalable and sustainable strategies to supply sponge biomass without threatening wild natural populations and to minimize the consumption of toxic organic solvents in metabol...

Short-time cycles of the water column can reflect undetectable changes in seasonal cycles, providing a high temporal resolution for quantifying seston availability. Here, trends in seston quantity and quality were investigated through intensive temporal cycle assessments at an IMTA site and a nearby fish farm facility (control site) during two diff...

This study investigates the effects on hard-bottom macro-zoobenthic communities of converting a mariculture plant into an Integrated Multi-Trophic Aquaculture (IMTA) system. This study was conducted from 2018 to 2021 in the semi-enclosed Mar Grande basin of Taranto (northern Ionian Sea), on a facility located 600 m off the coastline, with a product...

Integrated Multi-Trophic Aquaculture (IMTA) has been demonstrated to be a very useful tool to minimize the waste product production of fish monocultures whilst promoting biomass that can be used for different purposes. The stable isotope analysis (δ 13 C, δ 15 N, and C:N ratio) of bioremediating organisms present in an IMTA facility is critical to...

Even though the Mediterranean Sea is one of the best known marine ecoregion in the world, the diversity and distribution of several groups of marine invertebrates, including polychaetous annelids, are still far from being completed. In the context of a revision of the Italian checklist, the latest version of which is updated to 2005, we provide new...

Short summary: The current problems of shellfish farming in the Taranto area (Ionian Sea) are reported. The area once considered the kingdom of mussel farming in Europe, is at present experiencing serious problems in the production. Most of the problems arise from pollution but at present are especially linked to climate change. The possibility of...

Short summary: The list of alien marine faunal species reported along the Apulian coasts until 2010 is updated with data resulting from numerous ad hoc samplings adding several new findings. 70 new species were added, especially among Polychaeta, Mollusca, Crustacea, Ascidiacea, while alien Bryozoa are recorded for the first time. Among the recorde...

Sampling activities conducted in the Tyre Coast Nature Reserve, southern Lebanon, to study the marine annelid fauna of the area, allowed for the revision of the diversity of this group in Lebanon. We particularly focused on non-indigenous species (NIS), which were characterised from morphological and molecular points of view. A total of 116 taxa we...

The influence of benthic suspension feeders as bioremediating organisms on water column seston and their ability to mitigate fish farm waste was assessed by monthly analyses for one year. A monthly monitoring from July 2020 to October 2021 of physico-chemical and biochemical variables of the water column and the sediment was performed in an in-shor...

In recent years, population outbreaks of the annelid Hermodice carunculata (Polychaeta, Amphinomidae) are recurrently detected along the coastal zone of the Salento peninsula (Southern Italy), with impacts on marine benthic ecosystems. Annelida are renowned for their remarkable regeneration potential, enabling them to reform lost body parts. A hand...

Microplastics (MPs) are insidious plastic particles with sizes ranging from 1 to 5000 µm. Their presence has been reported all over the world. Recently, bioremediation to remove MPs from water columns using filter feeders as biofilters has been proposed. In a previous lab experiment , the MP bioremediation potential of four fouling organisms from a...

Utility and limits in the use of historical marine biodiversity datasets, for past reconstruction and recent evaluation of marine biodiversity and local ecological conditions, is here presented giving an example in the Gulf of Naples. The examined area is one of the better known of the entire Mediterranean sea due to historical observation on marin...

The Mytilus galloprovincialis (Lamarck, 1819) farming industry has been facing some difficulties in the Taranto Sea due to the increasing frequency and intensity of mass mortality events caused by summer heat waves. We investigated the possibility of shielding mussels from the heat by farming them at greater depths. We also investigated local popul...

The Salento Peninsula represents the eastern-most edge of the Italian Peninsula, and one of the first areas to be invaded by thermophilic non-indigenous species. The diversity of non-indigenous polychaetes occurring along the Salento Peninsula is reviewed based on literature data and new samples. Overall, fifteen non-indigenous polychaetes were rec...

In recent years, population outbreaks of the annelid Hermodice carunculata (Polychaeta, Amphinomidae) are recurrently detected along the coastal zone of the Salento peninsula (Southern Italy), with impacts on marine benthic ecosystems. Annelida are renowned for their remarkable regeneration potential, enabling them to reform lost body parts by asex...

Marine bioconstructions are complex habitats that represent a hotspot of biodiversity. Among Mediterranean bioconstructions, those thriving on mesophotic bottoms on southeastern Italian coasts are of particular interest due to their horizontal and vertical extension. In general, the communities that develop in the Mediterranean twilight zone encomp...

Amphipods are widespread in the marine environment, and some have adopted a symbiotic lifestyle, such as numerous species of the genus Leucothoe (Leach, 1814). Unfortunately, few examples of such a relationship are known for the Mediterranean Sea. In the present study, we report for the first time the symbiotic relationship between Leucothoe richia...

Myxicola infundibulum Montagu, 1808 is the most reported species of its genus, showing an unusually wide distribution from the Mediterranean area to Australia, North Europe, and North America, a situation deriving from a wide synonymizing of numerous species with M. infundibulum. Recently, genetic analysis confirmed that the Australian form of this...

Due to the presence of companion chaetae on the thoracic notopodia, a feature unnoticed on the material of the original description, the species Pseudobranchiomma tarantoensis (Knight-Jones & Giangrande, 2003) and P. marmarensis (Çinar & Giangrande, 2018) are here transferred to different genera; the former to the genus Sabella Linnaeus, 1767 and t...

Negli ultimi vent'anni, il settore dell'acquacoltura ha avuto un forte sviluppo e un ruolo essenziale nel fornire prodotti ittici ad una popolazione in crescita esponenziale. Tuttavia, tale industria non è esente da critiche per i suoi impatti ambientali negativi derivanti dai reflui di produzione. Questi problemi possono essere in parte risolti sv...

The cultivation of the Mediterranean mussel, Mytilus galloprovincialis Lamarck, 1819, has been tested in an innovative Integrated Multitrophic Aquaculture system (IMTA) in the Mar Grande of Taranto, as part of the EU-funded Remedialife project. This farming method could solve several problems including the low growth rate in mesotrophic environment...

Integrated Multitrophic Aquaculture (IMTA) seems to be one of the best solutions for sustainable aquaculture. Within the Remedia LIFE Project, an experimental IMTA plant was put in place in the Mar Grande of Taranto (Mediterranean Sea, Southern Italy). The polyculture of several bioremediating organisms, such as mussels, tubeworms, sponges, and sea...

This article is part of a book to honor the memory of Kristian Fauchald, the world authority in the systematics s and evolution of polychaetes, in occasion of the International Polychaete Conference held in Cardiff (Wales, U.K.) on July 2016. The article summarize a series of personal memories of our interactions (me and Adriana Giangrande) with Kr...

Microplastics (MPs) are a serious threat to the marine environment affecting ecosystem functioning and biodiversity. There is a vast literature about the uptake of MPs at different trophic levels, mainly focused on ecotoxicological effects in commercially relevant species. Little is still known about possible strategies to face MP pollution. Biorem...

This study explores the application and critical issues related to the implementation of blockchain technology (BT) to the aquaculture sector, in order to understand the possibilities of improving the relationship with the supply chain and the end consumer, with a view to a sustainability for the marine environment and circular economy. Starting fr...

The expected bioremediation effect, driven by the conversion of an inshore mariculture plant into an Integrated Multi-Trophic Aquaculture (IMTA) system, which could mitigate the fish farm impact, related to the accumulation of organic matter on the seabed, has been studied. The ecological quality status was studied following a Before-After-Control-...

The honeycomb worm Sabellaria alveolata is a gregarious tube-dwelling polychaete that builds remarkable biogenic reefs in marine coastal waters. Sabellaria alveolata reefs are considered valuable marine habitats requiring protection measures for their conservation, as they play a key role in the functioning of coastal ecosystems. Sabellarid reefs a...

Biodiversity is a broad concept that encompasses the diversity of nature, from the genetic to the habitat scale, and ensures the proper functioning of ecosystems. The Mediterranean Sea, one of the world's most biodiverse basins, faces major threats, such as overexploitation of resources and climate change. Here we provide the first multi-taxa inven...

Quantitative studies on population dynamics and life history traits of key species are useful to predict changes in the structure and organization of biological communities. In this context, Hermodice carunculata (Pallas, 1766) is a selective scavenger/carnivore polychaete species (known as a fireworm) that, in recent years, has exhibited a norther...

A widespread and diversified mesophotic system of carbonate bioconstructions along the Southern Adriatic and Ionian Italian coasts is described, providing new data on the distribution, structure and associated megabenthic assemblages of mesophotic Mediterranean bioconstructions. The bioconstructions were detected at six different sites off the coas...

Simple Summary The importance of aquaculture for providing animal proteins to a steeply increasing world population is growing. Despite the many benefits from this practice, there are also many constraints. Among them, the eutrophication of seawater and unsustainability are of the utmost importance. Integrated multitrophic aquaculture (IMTA), consi...

Reproduction of the terebellid Eupolymnia nesidensis was investigated in a population from the Ionian Sea (Mediterranean, South Italy). This species has a worldwide distribution and is very common on Mediterranean hard substrata covered by algae. Observations revealed a spawning period across springtime with lecithotrophic development occurring ins...

The biodiversity of macrobenthic invertebrates of two artificial hard substrates close to a mariculture plant was assessed in order to understand the effect on the fouling community of an innovative Integrated Multi-Trophic Aquaculture (IMTA) system. The examined hard substrates were (i) vertical bare collectors that are placed around the cages as...

Harmful algal blooms (HABs) are extreme biological events representing a major issue in marine, brackish, and freshwater systems worldwide. Their proliferation is certainly a problem from both ecological and socioeconomic contexts, as harmful algae can affect human health and activities, the marine ecosystem functioning, and the economy of coastal...

This study presents a description of Bispira riccardi sp. nov., a new habitat-forming sabellid polychaete from the mesophotic NW Mediterranean Sea. Individuals, up to 20 cm long, show a peculiar morphology of radioles, thoracic uncini, companion chaetae and ventral shield of the collar. The phylogenetic position of this new taxon in the genus Bispi...

Sabellaria species are among the most important frame-builders in temperate, shallow marine areas. These polychaetes are suspension feeders able to build bioconstructions using sand and shell fragments cemented with a sticky mucous. Such feature makes these invertebrates “unusual bioconstructors”, as they do not produce calcium carbonate. Sabellari...

This study investigated consumers' perceptions of green products derived from a circular economy production, by shedding light on the role of perceived social welfare. Furthermore, the paper considered two moderators: perceptual variables on green products and psychological variables on the environment. The analysis was performed in the aquaculture...

In the different mesophotic bioconstructions recently found along the Southeastern Italian coast, polychaetes have been proved to show high species richness and diversity, hitherto never investigated. In the present study, the species composition and functional role of polychaete assemblages were analysed; the updated key to identification of the M...

Sabellida are widespread, diverse and abundant in marine benthic habitats. Their distribution patterns on hard-bottom substrates are poorly studied so far. Little is known about the factors influencing their distribution, including the protection regimes that are known to affect assemblage diversity. We analyzed hard-bottom Sabellida at 1.5 and 5 m...

In this paper, the different possibilities and innovations related to sustainable aquaculture in the Mediterranean area are discussed, while different maricultural methods, and the role of Integrated Multi-Trophic Aquaculture (IMTA) in supporting the exploitation of the ocean’s resources, are also reviewed. IMTA, and mariculture in general, when ca...

The Taranto Seas of Italy, considered a hotspot of nonindigenous species (NIS) diversity, are also among the best locales in the Mediterranean to study marine fouling communities. This environment is an ideal space to study how artificial structures are utilised by NIS for further dispersion into the surrounding environment after their initial intr...

We report the description of nine new taxa of sabellid polychaetes belonging to the genus Amphiglena, of which diversity in the Mediterranean Sea has been widely underestimated. Examined material derived from both new collections along the Italian coast, including four CO 2 vents/hydrothermal systems, and from a re-examination of older material pre...

The multiple roles of Polychaetes and bioconstructor and habitat formers, within the marine animal forests.

We provide an overview on taxonomic and functional diversity of polychaetes in relation to ocean acidification (OA) derived from research at the CO2 vents system off Ischia (Castello Aragonese). A total of 119 taxa were censused in the area; studies have highlighted the occurrence of species new to science, sibling and alien taxa, dominance of a fe...

Having a reliable ecological reference baseline is pivotal to understanding the current status of benthic assemblages. Ecological awareness of our perception of environmental changes could be better described based on historical data. Otherwise, we meet with the shifting baseline syndrome (SBS). Facing SBS harmful consequences on environmental and...

The spionid polychaete Pseudopolydora paucibranchiata (Okuda, 1937) was originally described from Japan and has since been reported as a non-indigenous species in soft bottom communities in the Northeast Pacific, the Mediterranean Sea, around Europe, Australia, Brazil, and Florida. The diagnostic features of the adults are palps with ramified yello...

Fouling assemblage colonizing fish-farms is considered mostly to produce negative impacts causing financial loss. By contrast, large evidences emerged on the bioremediation role by biofouling associated to aquaculture facilities , even if the fouling assemblages thriving in the water column was poorly investigated. The aim of the present work was t...

The knowledge on the hard bottom polychaete assemblages in the Northern Adriatic Sea, a Mediterranean region strongly affected by environmental pressures, is scarce and outdated. The objective of this paper was to update the information on polychaete diversity and depict their patterns of natural spatial variation, in relation to changes in algal c...

In this paper, we report data from the first year of rearing of a set of filter feeder bioremediator organisms: macrobenthic invertebrates (sabellid polychaetes and sponges), coupled with macroalgae, realized in a mariculture fish farm. This innovative integrated multi-trophic aquaculture (IMTA) system was realized at a preindustrial level in the G...

Observations on the reproductive behavior and larval development of the bristled fireworm Hermodice carunculata, a common inhabitant of shallow marine rocky bottoms in the Southern Mediterranean Sea, are reported here. In recent years, an increase in abundance and a northward expansion of the populations along the Southern Italian coast were jointl...

The present paper provides a multidisciplinary fine-scale description of a Mediterranean mesophotic new habitat dominated by the bivalve Neopycnodonte cochlear (Poli, 1795), building large and thick pinnacles on vertical cliffs at two study areas along the southern Italian coast. The pinnacles, constituted by a multilayered aggregation of living an...

Non-indigenous species (NIS) represent one of the most relevant threats to biodiversity, ecosystem functioning and human activities, and their occurrence and spread have been the subject of numerous works and revisions. However, the information available is rather confused for several taxa, including polychaetes, which are characterised by having a...

In recent decades, the high introduction rate of alien species (AS) has been mainly due to the increasingly widespread human movements, which often compromise natural barriers, facilitating the invasion of new geographic areas and environments. Being completely new in the recipient habitat, alien invasive species can often have strongly negative im...

The family Syllidae, aside from representing the most species-rich family in Annelida, is characterized by a number of sexual and asexual reproductive strategies. With the exception of a few viviparous species, the subfamily Syllinae is characterized by schizogamous reproduction with pelagic larval stages and without parental care. Laboratory reari...

This study investigates two populations of a polychaete identified as Ophelia barquii Fauvel, 1927, collected in two beaches from the Adriatic (Alimini beach) and Ionian (Gallipoli beach) coasts from the Salento Peninsula. Each population was analyzed monthly from April 2017 to March 2018. In both beaches, populational density decreased from April...

Polychaetes are widespread across marine ecosystem reaching high density in various seabed habitats, where they play a relevant role in the functioning of benthic communities. Many polychaetes are sessile and tube-dwelling forms, often gregarious, which are able to create primary biogenic structures or to modify the abiotic characteristics of the p...

Aquaculture expansion is limited by the negative environmental impact of the waste and the need for alternative sources in the diet of reared fish. In this framework, for the first time, the survival rates, biomass gain, and fatty acid profiles of the polychaete Sabella spallanzanii and the macroalga Chaetomorpha linum, reared/cultivated as bioreme...

Filter feeding invertebrates are a relevant component of fouling assemblages with a pivotal role in ecological processes, since they improve water quality, enhance habitat heterogeneity and transfer organic matter from the water column to the benthos. They modulate the availability of resources to other species, with effects on the density and beha...

Many marine organisms, including invertebrates, produce mucosal matrices having different functions. Besides mechanical protection, the mucus of many invertebrates contains specific compounds to make the animal poisonous and/or distasteful or irritating. The presence of antibiotic molecules is more advantageous for some invertebrates to contrast ba...

The paper deals with some current aspects related to the change that is taking place in the marine benthic assemblages, focusing particularly on the acceleration rate generated because of the anthropogenic pressures. Considering the necessity of specific biomonitoring on the communities status, the Authors point out the risk of the incoming "Shifti...

This is the first description of a Mediterranean mesophotic coral reef. The bioconstruction extended for 2.5 km along the Italian Adriatic coast in the bathymetric range −30/−55 m. It appeared as a framework of coral blocks mostly built by two scleractinians, Phyllangia americana mouchezii (Lacaze-Duthiers, 1897) and Polycyathus muellerae (Abel, 19...

The aim of this study was to test the effects of short- and long-term exposure to high pCO2 on the invasive polychaete Branchiomma boholense (Grube, 1878), (Sabellidae), through the implementation of a transplant experiment at the CO2 vents of the Castello Aragonese at the island of Ischia (Italy). Analysis of carbonic anhydrase (CA) activity, prot...

In the framework of faunistic research conducted along the Apulian coast of Italy, three new species of thelepodid polychaetes are reported: Streblosoma pseudocomatus sp. nov., S. nogueirai sp. nov. and S. hutchingsae sp. nov. The taxonomic position of S. comatus is clarified and emended as Thelepus comatus. The described species are characterised...

Marine bioconstructions are biodiversity-rich, three-dimensional biogenic structures, regulating key ecological functions of benthic ecosystems worldwide. Tropical coral reefs are outstanding for their beauty, diversity and complexity, but analogous types of bioconstructions are also present in temperate seas. The main bioconstructions in the Medit...

The present study investigates macrofouling development in the Mar Grande of Taranto (Central Mediterranean Sea), a wide confined area that has attracted considerable attention in recent years due to the establishment of numerous non-indigenous species (NIS). Different starting times of a yearly primary succession on artificial substrates were trac...

The present paper deals with the description of specimens of a new species of Pseudobranchiomma Jones, 1962 collected from the Sea of Marmara between 50 and 100 m depths, a genus that, up to now, is represented within the Mediterranean area by only one species. The new species is mainly characterized by having radioles without serrations, well-deve...

Marine bioconstructions are biodiversity-rich, three-dimensional biogenic structures, regulating key ecological functions of benthic ecosystems worldwide. Tropical coral reefs are outstanding for their beauty, diversity and complexity, but analogous types of bioconstructions are also present in temperate seas. The main bioconstructions in the Medit...

The project “Biodiversity MARE Tricase” aims to research and promote coastal and marine biodiversity at the MARE Outpost (Avamposto MARE), a marine station established in Tricase (Lecce, Italy) in 2015. From March 2016 to September 2017, the first biodiversity inventory of the Tricase coastal area (Ionian Sea) was realized with the aid of citizen s...

This study was performed to analyse the genetic and morphological diversity of the sabellid annelid genus Branchiomma, with special emphasis on a taxon so far identified as Branchiomma bairdi. This species, originally described from Bermuda, has frequently been reported as an invader in the Mediterranean, the Atlantic and the Eastern Pacific, but r...

List of specimens utilized for the study with the related GenBank accession numbers and sampling localities. (CSV)

Distribution and frequency of COI haplotypes (rows) across the studied populations (columns). (CSV)

Average Kimura two-parameter (K2P) distance between the different sampled localities. Values that are significant are in bold. (CSV)

Pairwise ΦST values of molecular differentiation between samples. Values that were significant are in bold. (CSV)