Melita Mokos

University of Zadar · Department of Ecology, Agronomy and Aquaculture

The Mediterranean Sea is recognized as a key component in the development, economy, and culture of European, North African, and Middle East countries. With respect to heterogeneity across the region in different sectors, Ocean Literacy, though still in its infancy, is nevertheless a requisite for a better understanding of the two-way interaction be...

Human activities have put the ocean under unprecedented pressure. Still, levels of public understanding about the ocean remain low. Ocean literacy is a global movement that aims to improve the understanding of the ocean and provide an incentive for positive change in people’s behavior. To date, there is no validated scale targeted to adults to meas...

The Mediterranean Sea is recognized as a key component in the development, economy, and culture of European, North African , and Middle East countries. With respect to heterogeneity across the region in different sectors, Ocean Literacy, though still in its infancy, is nevertheless a requisite for a better understanding of the two-way interaction b...

The Mediterranean Sea is characterized by rich biodiversity, and its region hosts people living in several countries with a rich variety of cultures, but-at the same time-it is "under siege", due to anthropogenic pressures. To address these pressures, many actions are needed aiming, among others, at establishing Ocean Literacy (OL) across the Medit...

Ocean Literacy (OL) emerged in the USA in the 2000s as a concept developed for the education system aimed at teachers. In 2011, it gained the attention of European educators who formed the first OL network in Europe, the European Marine Science Ed-ucators Association (EMSEA). Parallel to that initiative, Portugal started the first initiative to ado...

The Mediterranean Sea is characterized by rich biodiversity, and its region hosts people living in several countries with a rich variety of cultures, but-at the same time-it is "under siege", due to anthropogenic pressures. To address these pressures, many actions are needed aiming, among others, at establishing Ocean Literacy (OL) across the Medit...

In recent years, ocean literacy has become a global movement that connects the human dimension to the ocean and intends to be an incentive for positive change in people’s behavior. As multiple initiatives on ocean literacy have arisen, a comprehensive understanding of this topic is required to better engage the broader society. In the present study...

Ocean Literacy (OL) is considered to be important for raising awareness of the people concerning conservation, restoration and sustainable use of the ocean and its resources. Addressing environmental issues related to the Mediterranean SeaMediterranean Sea and increasing OL can be the first step to achieve Sustainable Development Goal 14UN Sustaina...

Even though the ocean is a defining feature on Earth that regulates climate and provides oxygen, food, and jobs, students still have low to moderate marine and ocean literacy knowledge. Ocean literacy is an understanding of the ocean's influence on people and people's influence on the ocean. It is an emerging need necessary for ensuring the sustain...

Marine Protected Areas and other managed marine sites are designated to improve the status of coastal fish assemblages and protect valuable habitats. The implementation of management practices relies on data collected through monitoring activities. The monitoring of fish assemblages using the standard non-destructive methods requires significant fi...

Ocean Literacy (OL) has been defined as an understanding of the ocean’s influence on people and their influence on the ocean. The OL movement was born in the US and its framework consisted of seven essential principles and 45 fundamental concepts; it is now largely accepted worldwide for use in both formal (schools and universities) and non-formal...

Marine litter is recognized as a global marine environmental problem. Beach litter surveys are used to monitor litter pollution and can be used to determine the origins of litter which can be used for the improvement of waste management. This research studied abundance, composition and sources of marine litter on the beach during one year period in...

Although extensive studies have been made on Posidonia oceanica ecosystems, in terms of their pheno-logical characteristics, shoot density, biomass, and associated faunal assemblages, little attention has been given to the depth distribution of this species in the Adriatic Sea. The depth limits of the Mediterranean endemic sea-grass P. oceanica gro...

Marine litter is a worldwide problem. It impacts negatively marine environment, organisms, human health and coastal communities. In this research, abundance, composition and sources of marine litter (macro-debris > 2.5 cm) and beach cleanliness were assessed for three beaches in the central Croatian Adriatic Sea. Mean abundance for the studied regi...

A European Maritime Day (EMD) 2019 event was held at a Greek mainland middle school in which twenty-two fifteen-years-old students participated. The event included a presentation, two hands-on labs (“Floating and non-floating plastics”, “The voyage of rubber ducks”), one drama activity (“How do sea food chains work?”) as well as one drawing and han...

Ocean Literacy (OL) is of paramount importance nowadays as the life-giving ocean is seriously under threat. Children who are considered to be the “living arrows sent forth” should have the opportunity to become citizens able to make informed and responsible decisions about the ocean. Members of the European Marine Science Educators Association from...

The content of the Marine Environment Protection course at the Maritime Department of the University of Zadar goes beyond STCW requirements. It addresses a number of environmental topics aiming to improve ocean environmental knowledge base in order to reduce future seafarers` poor environmental decision making and/or actions. Because the course is...

A good understanding of the role and function of the ocean seems to be of paramount importance in recent years, constituting the basic tool for the promotion of healthy and sustainable marine environment, and a target area of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. In this study, the content knowledge of elementary school students (grades 3-6)...

EMSEA Med is an international Mediterranean group of educators and scientists/researchers. It was established in 2015 within EMSEA on the basis of the common regional origin and of the shared interest for the promotion of OL along the Mediterranean Sea. This “Sea in the middle of the Earth”, the largest and deepest enclosed sea on Earth, cradle of...

The Mediterranean Sea region is the cradle of modern civilization, a biodiversity hotspot, the most visited touristic area and home to over 460 million people. Increasing stresses due to tourism, fishing, coastal development, pollution, shipping and climate change are threatening the fragile Mediterranean Sea ecosystem. Sustainable development of t...

We report the first record of vertical rhizome growth in the temperate seagrass Zostera marina. In a population of Z. marina occurring on subtidal sand in the Novigrad Sea (Croatia), an area subject to episodic high sediment transport, collected plants of Z. marina showed vertical rhizomes with shorter and narrower inter-nodes (mean length = 3.4 ±...

Building on the EMSEA experience, a group of researchers and educators from the Mediterranean Region, EMSEA-MED, started a collaborative and innovative effort to promote the ocean literacy principles in the region, and to adapt them to the specificities of the Mare Nostrum. The Mediterranean Sea is not only considered the cradle of civilization, b...

The experiment (part of INOVADA project financed by European funds), is aimed at heads and speculate that the production of mussels, using IMTA (Integrated Aquaculture Multitrophic) can be related to traditional breeding sites, near river mouths, as the oligotrophic environment that characterizes the Adriatic sea does not allow a mussel farming in...

Croatia is a country with over 6000 km of coast, and marine surface of more than 31000 km 2. This data indicates Croatia's strong connection to the sea. Adriatic sea is of a priceless value to Croatia and its citizens which are strongly oriented towards the sea mostly through tourism and fisheries. While living in the times of great coastal pressur...

Increased sediment loads in marine environments are caused by many different anthropogenic activities and more frequent storms due to climate change. Increases in sedimentation leads to increases in turbidity, which reduces penetration of light in the water. Deposited sediment buries the lower parts of the plant including photosynthetic tissues. A...

Sediment movement is a major force in the evolutionary ecology of seagrasses. Sediment movement can cause retreat or expansion of the seagrass bed, and sorting of species according to their tolerances of erosion or deposition. The objectives of this study were 1) to assess the effectiveness of DGPS/videography in demonstrating sediment movement and...

Within the scope of a seagrass monitoring program in the Novigrad Sea, Central Croatian Adriatic, we predicted that the annual variability in coverage of seagrasses (Zostera marina, Zostera noltii, and Cymodocea nodosa) can be partially explained by the annual variability in sediment translocation. From 23 fixed DGPS-referenced monitoring video tra...

Evidence for competition between two co-occurring seagrass species, Zostera is given.

Evidence for competition between two co-occurring seagrass species, Zostera noltii and Z. marina, was found along an isobath transect in Novigrad Sea, Central Croatian Adriatic. The transect included developed (marina) and undeveloped regions of shoreline. Each species’ coverage and presence was evaluated using DGPS-tracked underwater videography....