Meri Bilan

Università del Salento | Unisalento · Laboratory of Zoology and Marine Biology

Sea pens (Octocorallia, Pennatulacea) are a specialized and morphologically distinct group of octocorals. The majority of them have adapted to survive on soft sediments with the help of an anchoring muscular peduncle. The whip-like sea pen Protoptilum carpenteri is considered a deep-sea North Atlantic species, which recently has been documented als...

Restoration is considered an effective strategy to accelerate the recovery of biological communities at local scale. However, the effects of restoration actions in the marine ecosystems are still unpredictable. We performed a global analysis of published literature to identify the factors increasing the probability of restoration success in coastal...

Cold-water coral (CWC) habitats dwell on continental shelves, slopes, seamounts, and ridge systems around the world’s oceans from 50 to 4000 m depth, providing heterogeneous habitats which support a myriad of associated fauna. These highly diverse ecosystems are threatened by human stressors such as fishing activities, gas and oil exploitation, and...

The feeding biology of deep-sea octocorals remains poorly understood, as attention is more often directed to reef building corals. The present study focused on two common deep-water octocoral species in the Azores Archipelago, Dentomuricea aff. meteor and Viminella flagellum, aiming at determining their ability to exploit different food sources. We...

This Collective Article presents information about 21 taxa belonging to seven Phyla (one Ochrophyta, one Porifera, three Cni-daria, two Arthropoda, three Mollusca, one Echinodermata, and ten Chordata) and extending from the western Mediterranean Sea to the Levantine Sea. The new records were reported from nine countries as follows: Spain: first rec...

Nowadays, there are an increasing number of reports of deep-sea accumulation of marine debris, often associated with a wide array of pernicious effects on benthic fauna. Nevertheless, there is still a huge knowledge gap regarding the interaction of benthic organisms and marine debris. In this paper, we report for the first time the colonization of...

Benthic suspension feeders have developed a variety of feeding strategies and food availability has often proven to be a key factor explaining their occurrence and distribution. The feeding biology of coral species has been the target of an increasing number of studies, however most of them focus on Scleractinia and Octocorallia, while information...

To understand the restoration potential of degraded habitats, it is important to know the key processes and habitat features that allow for recovery after disturbance. As part of the EU (Horizon 2020) funded MERCES project, a group of European experts compiled and assessed current knowledge, from both past and ongoing restoration efforts, within th...

Knowledge on basic biological functions of organisms is essential to understand not only the role they play in the ecosystems but also to manage and protect their populations. The study of biological processes, such as growth, reproduction and physiology, which can be approached in situ or by collecting specimens and rearing them in aquaria, is par...

Cnidarians, characterized by high levels of plasticity, exhibit remarkable mechanisms to withstand or escape unfavourable conditions including reverse development which describes processes of transformation of adult stages into early developmental stages with higher mobility. Polyp bailout is a stress-escape response common among scleractinian spec...

An important goal of the ATLAS project is to improve our understanding of the ocean transport pathways and connectivity of water masses at basin and regional scales relevant for benthic marine ecosystems. The MEDWAVES cruise (21st September-26th October, 2016) aimed to better understand the characteristics of the Mediterranean Outflow Water (MOW) a...

A review of 573 studies on active restoration actions in the marine environment, published in the last 25 years, was carried out at global scale. We assessed how, where, at which spatial and temporal scales and under which socio-ecological settings restoration studies have been carried out, from very shallow to deep sea habitats. Results show that...

A review of 573 studies on active restoration actions in the marine environment, published in the last 25 years, was carried out at global scale. We assessed how, where, at which spatial and temporal scales and under which socio-ecological settings restoration studies have been carried out, from very shallow to deep sea habitats. Results show that...

MERCES is producing a census of European marine key habitat maps, degraded habitat maps and investigating key habitat restoration potential.

The overall scope of MERCES Deliverable 1.2 is to review current knowledge regarding the major marine pressures placed upon marine ecosystems in EU waters and the mechanisms by which they impact habitats in order to determine potential restoration pathways.

Human activities crisscross the urban and coastal fabric, and expand into the off shore and deep sea, deriving numerous associated pressures often impacting marine habitats. A main goal of the ongoing MERCES project (http://www.merces-project.eu/) is to produce a catalogue of available maps for existing activities and pressures in the European Seas...

Solar-powered animals are particularly susceptible to climate change because photo-synthesis brings major risks to animals under environmental stress. Although some groups have been widely studied (e.g. corals), little information is available on how other less charismatic photosynthetic animals (e.g. sea slugs) will respond to future ocean conditi...

The MEDWAVES (MEDiterranean out flow WAter and Vulnerable EcosystemS) cruise targeted areas under the potential influence of the MOW within the Mediterranean and Atlantic realms. These include seamounts where Cold-water corals (CWCs) have been reported but that are still poorly known, and which may act as essential “stepping stones” connecting faun...

One of the main goals of MERCES project (http://www.merces-project.eu/) is to produce a census of available maps for marine habitats, along with their degradation status and restoration potential in the European Seas. To achieve this goal, we performed an extensive review and compiled a catalogue with mapping sources for (a) marine key-habitats, (b...