text:
<?php

namespace spec\PhpSpec\Matcher;

use PhpSpec\ObjectBehavior;
use Prophecy\Argument;

use PhpSpec\Formatter\Presenter\Presenter;
use PhpSpec\Exception\Example\FailureException;

use ArrayObject;

class TypeMatcherSpec extends ObjectBehavior
{
    function let(Presenter $presenter)
    {
        $presenter->presentString(Argument::any())->willReturnArgument();
        $presenter->presentValue(Argument::any())->willReturn('object');

        $this->beConstructedWith($presenter);
    }

    function it_is_a_matcher()
    {
        $this->shouldBeAnInstanceOf('PhpSpec\Matcher\MatcherInterface');
    }

    function it_responds_to_beAnInstanceOf()
    {
        $this->supports('beAnInstanceOf', '', array(''))->shouldReturn(true);
    }

    function it_responds_to_returnAnInstanceOf()
    {
        $this->supports('returnAnInstanceOf', '', array(''))->shouldReturn(true);
    }

    function it_responds_to_haveType()
    {
        $this->supports('haveType', '', array(''))->shouldReturn(true);
    }

    function it_matches_subclass_instance(ArrayObject $object)
    {
        $this->shouldNotThrow()
            ->duringPositiveMatch('haveType', $object, array('ArrayObject'));
    }

    function it_matches_interface_instance(ArrayObject $object)
    {
        $this->shouldNotThrow()
            ->duringPositiveMatch('haveType', $object, array('ArrayAccess'));
    }

    function it_does_not_match_wrong_class(ArrayObject $object)
    {
        $this->shouldThrow(new FailureException(
            'Expected an instance of stdClass, but got object.'
        ))->duringPositiveMatch('haveType', $object, array('stdClass'));
    }

    function it_does_not_match_wrong_interface(ArrayObject $object)
    {
        $this->shouldThrow(new FailureException(
            'Expected an instance of SessionHandlerInterface, but got object.'
        ))->duringPositiveMatch('haveType', $object, array('SessionHandlerInterface'));
    }

    function it_matches_other_class(ArrayObject $object)
    {
        $this->shouldNotThrow()->duringNegativeMatch('haveType', $object, array('stdClass'));
    }

    function it_matches_other_interface()
    {
        $this->shouldNotThrow()
            ->duringNegativeMatch('haveType', $this, array('SessionHandlerInterface'));
    }
}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


We have a box to fit your budget.
Great for watermelons, cantaloupe, pumpkins, apples, onions, seed, pickles and other produce.
We'll show you how you can find significant savings on the bulk produce boxes you use. Explain your application to your customer service representative and we'll deliver the box you need.
Call 800-253-2840 or Submit Form Below for Pricing and Availability.


text:
Jungs församling var en församling i Skara stift och i Vara kommun. Församlingen uppgick 2002 i Kvänums församling.

Administrativ historik
Församlingen har medeltida ursprung.

Församlingen var till 1962 moderförsamling i pastoratet Jung och Fyrunga som från 1549 även omfattade Öttums församling och mellan 1549 och 1571 Vinköls församling. Från 1962 var den annexförsamling i pastoratet Kvänum, Norra Vånga, Edsvära, Jung, Öttum och Fyrunga. Församlingen uppgick 2002 i Kvänums församling.

Organister

Kyrkor

Jungs kyrka

Se även
Jungs socken

Källor

Indelningar i Vara kommun
Historiska församlingar i Skara stift

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


Better Projects: Who decides a project's requirements? Testers?
Who decides a project's requirements? Testers?
Well-defined project requirements should enable the testing team to develop accurate test cases to verify the functionality under consideration. It is vital that the testing team be involved in the project from the requirements elicitation milestone.
What ever may be the requirements the quality team would view for the following key attributes which includes the system's performance, response time, handling load and transactions of the system.
After studying the business requirements and review of the spec the testing team starts with planning, designing, and executing tests cases for features that need to be released upon customer's requests.
Where developers go upon assumptions testers expect the product to behave differently from what the developers have developed thereby resulting in an overall cycle time delay.
Some times very little time is given for the testing team to test the solution. In case the project is running behind schedule the testing milestone may be not given due importance.


Hezekiah Goode plays three tracks from Two Billion Acres Of Salt and talks about writing songs about true stories and the happiest instrument.
Jonny Two Bags plays tracks from Salvation Town and talks about his early days in the Los Angeles punk scene and the skateboard as metaphor.
Candi Staton tells the story about her early days in music, how she met Rick Hall of FAME studios and plays tracks from Life Happens.
Also on this episode, blues rock from Tommy Malone, country from Moot Davis, alt-folk from The Secret Sisters, soulful blues from Brigitte DeMeyer, honky tonk from John Howie Jr. and the Rosewood Bluff and retro soul from St. Paul & The Broken Bones.
A couple of weeks ago, I was invited by David and Paul to be their guest on their show, the Homegrown Sunday Ramble on Homegrown Radio NJ. I'm never going to turn down the chance to hang out and talk about music, so of course I said yes.
They graciously gave me permission to share this episode of Homegrown Sunday Ramble on my feed. So enjoy! And when you're done listening, mark your calendar to listen to their show on Sunday nights, from 7-9pm Eastern.
John Howie Jr plays three tracks from Everything Except Goodbye, tells the story behind the new band name and why Earnest Tubb deserves a tribute show.
Also on this episode, southern rock from Jimbo Mathus, west coast indie rock from Chuck Ragan, trance blues from Turchi, new soul music from Candi Staton, roots rock from Bill Kirchen, folk rock from Twin Forks, country from Rodney Crowell, and retro-soul from St. Paul & The Broken Bones.


Everybody knows the convenience of a plastic water bottle purchased from the store, but they also know the hazards that comes along with that plastic. Not only is it bad for landfills and the environment, but it's plastic so it has chemicals in it as well. That's why the benefits of a reusable water bottle are FANTASTIC. We received the Earth Map Stainless Steel Reusable Bottle from Tazzini. It is BPA free, Leakproof and 18/8 stainless steel!
I love it. It is truly leak proof. It has a flip top and then the mouth part spins to the side and it opens it up so you can drink. it requires a decent amount of suction to get stuff out. But I do love it. This is great for in the car, the gym, on a bike ride or whatever else. The fact that it's safe and has no chemicals is worth it in itself. I would like 3-4 of these so I always have one clean and just keep using them. It's steel so it's not going to break down over time either.
Price: $19.95 is MSRP, but they're $17.95 right now on the website.
Overall: ***** easy to use, doesn't leak and even Avery can use it.
I learned that they donate a percentage of their proceeds to organizations that seek to prevent toxin-induced illnesses.
I learned that they are flavor-free, which is important to me because I hate it when water picks up another flavor from plastic or metal! carolinastamper at gmail dot com.
YOu can buy them at greenfeet.com.
I learned that stainless-steal bottles are more bacteria-resistant than plastic bottles. I had no idea!
I learned that if you purchase 2 or more bottles you get free shipping!! That is so awesome because shipping is so expensive!
Plastic and aluminum bottles usually have BPA, phthalates, lead and other toxins that can leach into your beverage and the environment upon their disposal. Stainless is safe and completely free of BPA, phthalates, lead and other toxins and works with acidic beverages and foods.
I learned that a study by Coffey Laboratories in Oregon showed that stainless steel bottles are naturally more bacteria resistant than plastic bottles.
I learned that stainless steel is safer than aluminum and plastic.
They have a 1 year gurantee.
Stainless steel is much healthier for you and for our planet.
I learned that even BPA-free plastic leaches harmful toxins when exposed to heat. That'a good to know since I heat my daughter BPA free bottles in the microwave.
They donate to charities and thats a BIG plus in my opinion!
We needed stainless steel bottles that were easy to clean and transport, would not leak, impart weird flavors, or alter the taste of our liquid. And that proved to be a far more difficult task. So difficult in fact, that it was easier for us to produce our own line than it was to find an existing bottle that measured up to our high standards.
I learned that they have "Great Design. A lot of thought and planning went in to our design. Our tapered bottle shape makes it easy to carry for hands of all sizes, and the slim profile means they fit in most cupholders, bike bottle holders and backpack pockets. The lid stays on, so it won't get lost. The dome-shaped cap keeps the spout clean whenever it's not in use." Good stuff!
I learned that you can put pretty much any beverage in it including wine and soda.
Stainless steel is easy to clean, durable, inert and sanitary.
i learned that they recently won Best Product of the Year in the Inventor's Showcase at the Moms in Business conference!
Tazzinis are generously sized and hold 24.7 ounces of just about any cold or warm beverage, from water to iced teas, carbonated beverages, and even wine. Click here for ideas. At the end of their useful life (a long time with proper care!), they are 100% recyclable.


text:
Duncan Russell (12 March 1958 – 18 August 2017) was an English football manager who was in charge of Conference National side Mansfield Town and Hucknall Town.

Career

Coaching
Russell began his coaching career at Derby County and subsequently joined Walsall where he enjoyed promotion to the old Division One in 2001. Promotions were also gained at Wolverhampton Wanderers in 2003 and at MK Dons when they also completed the double by claiming the Football League Trophy in 2008. He followed Paul Ince to Blackburn Rovers soon after and has coached some of England's top players in recent times including Matthew Le Tissier and Paul Gascoigne.

Management
In May 2010 Russell joined Mansfield Town as assistant manager to David Holdsworth. Following Holdsworth's sacking in November of that year, Russell was placed as caretaker manager, before taking control of the team on a permanent basis. Russell's contract was not renewed at the end of the 2010/11 season and he subsequently left Field Mill.Duncan's final game as Mansfield Town manager came at Wembley Stadium in the FA Trophy Final on 7 May 2011 which Mansfield lost extremely late in extra time to Darlington 1-0.

On 30 May 2013 he was appointed manager of Hucknall Town, although less than six weeks later he left the club as he was not prepared to drop two leagues.

Death
Duncan died on 18 August  2017 age 59 in a Derby Hospice after a short battle with cancer.

Statistics

Managerial stats
Competitive matches only - Correct as of 17 July 2013

References

https://web.archive.org/web/20130707003408/http://www.thisisnottingham.co.uk/Hucknall-Town-new-boss/story-19133280-detail/story.html#axzz2UThVCkeP

External links

1958 births
2017 deaths
Sportspeople from London
English football managers
Mansfield Town F.C. managers
Hucknall Town F.C. managers


text:
is a JR West Sanyō Main Line and Hakubi Line railway station located in 1-1 1-chōme, Achi, Kurashiki, Okayama Prefecture, Japan. All Sanyō Main Line and Hakubi Line express and limited express trains stop at this station. The Mizushima Coastal Railway Kurashiki-shi Station is near the station.

History
1891-04-25: Kurashiki Station opens as a station on the San'yō Railway
1906-12-01: Kurashiki station is nationalized
1987-04-01: Japanese National Railways is privatized, and Kurashiki Station becomes a JR West station
Spring 2007: Automatic ticket gates will be installed and begin being used
Summer 2007: The ICOCA card was scheduled to be accepted

Station building and platforms

Kurashiki Station features both side- and island-style platform capable of handling several lines simultaneously. Each platform has an upper (上り) and lower end (下り) of the platform.

Facilities located within the station building include the LeBlanc department store, the Hotel Kurashiki, the Nippon Travel Agency, McDonald's, and ATMs for Chugoku Bank and Tomato Bank.

Environs

South entrance
At the south entrance to Kurashiki Station is Kurashiki-shi Station, operated by Mizushima Coastal Railway as a station on the Mizushima Main Line. Chayamachi Station, which services the Uno and Honshibasan Lines (including the Seto Ōhashi Line) is accessible via a 22-minute bus ride operated by Shimotsui Electric Railway.
Ōhara Art Museum
Kurashiki Bikan Area
Kurashiki Station South Entrance Toyoko Inn
Kurashiki City Plaza East Building
Kurashiki City Plaza West Building
Mizuho Bank
Tenmaya department store
Japan Postal savings ATM
Marunaka Kurashiki Station store (formerly Daiei Kurashiki)
Kurashiki Post Office and Kurashiki Japan Post Main Office
Kagawa Bank
Ryobi Sightseeing Bus Company, Kurashiki Office
Jumbo JJ Kurashiki Station Store (pachinko)
Mizushima Taxi

North entrance
Outside the north entrance was Kurashiki Tivoli Park, a popular amusement park, closed in 2008.
Kohnan Kurashiki Tivoli Park Store (home center)
Kurashiki Kotobuki-chō Post Office
Kurashiki Suishō High School
Kurashiki Municipal Higashi Junior High School

Highway access
 Japan National Route 429 (formerly Route 2)
 Okayama Prefectural Route 24 (Kurashiki-Kiyone Route)

Connecting lines
All lines are JR West lines.
Sanyō Main Line
Express (Sun Liner)
Okayama Station — Kurashiki Station — Shin-Kurashiki Station
Local (becomes an express west of Saijō)
Nakashō Station — Kurashiki Station — Nishiachi Station
Hakubi Line
Sleeping Limited Expeess (Sunrise Izumo)
(Okayama Station) — Kurashiki Station — Bitchu-Takahashi Station
Local
(Nakashō Station) — Kurashiki Station — Kiyone Station

External links

Hakubi Line
Railway stations in Okayama Prefecture
Railway stations in Japan opened in 1891
Kurashiki


I am taking a two strip vacation. To what? To work! Yay!
And I have two amazing fill-ins for you. The first by Don Ahé of Road Apples Almanac (colored by me).
I think that if there is any current embodiment of George Herriman, it is Don Ahé. His cartooning is simple and incredibly expressive. His humor is gentle, hilarious, and utterly unpretentious. I cannot recommend his work enough.
I was fortunate enough to meet Don at TCAF last year. Sadly I won't be making it to TCAF this year (this spring already guarantees to overwhelm me), but here's a memory of happy day of Don, Brian, and myself about town.
How sweet, the loving couple get together.
Panel 8, "suicidal pill" should probably be "suicide pill". Unless it's meant to describe a sentient pill that wants to kill itself.
These are the kinds of worlds you want to avoid.
At first it reminded me of Luke Skywalker's whinging when he commenced searching for [The GREAT Jedi Warrior] Yoda on Dagoba.
The blue guy's name is Baldwin in reverse. Why would you kill a baldwin, just because they're a dime a dozen?
I bet the "La-La" bird is the most dangerous one on that planet. It is beautiful though. Very colorful.
@Night-Gaunt, of course she's the most dangerous creature on the planet! There's a scene in "The Godfather" when Michael Corleone is hiding out in Sicily. He catches his first glimpse of Apollonia and is instantly smitten. His friend sees this and tells Michael "In Sicily, women are more dangerous than shotguns." I get the feeling it's that way on this planet, too.
Awesome, Don!… and Chris' colors are fantastic!
Yep, recognized Oohlooh right away. I wonder if the next strip will show how Curn convinced her to leave her homeworld.


text:
The Black Sea is a marginal mediterranean sea of the Atlantic Ocean lying between Europe and Asia, east of the Balkans, south of the East European Plain, west of the Caucasus, and north of Anatolia. It is bounded by Bulgaria, Georgia, Romania, Russia, Turkey, and Ukraine. The Black Sea is supplied by major rivers, principally the Danube, Dnieper, and Don. Consequently, while six countries have a coastline on the sea, its drainage basin includes parts of 24 countries in Europe.

The Black Sea covers  (not including the Sea of Azov), has a maximum depth of , and a volume of .
Most of its coasts ascend rapidly.
These rises are the Pontic Mountains to the south, bar the southwest-facing peninsulas, the Caucasus Mountains to the east, and the Crimean Mountains to the mid-north.
In the west, the coast is generally small floodplains below foothills such as the Strandzha; Cape Emine, a dwindling of the east end of the Balkan Mountains; and the Dobruja Plateau considerably farther north.
The longest east–west extent is about .
Important cities along the coast include (clockwise from the Bosporus) Burgas, Varna, Constanța, Odesa, Sevastopol, Novorossiysk, Sochi, Batumi, Trabzon and Samsun.

The Black Sea has a positive water balance, with an annual net outflow of  per year through the Bosporus and the Dardanelles into the Aegean Sea. While the net flow of water through the Bosporus and Dardanelles (known collectively as the Turkish Straits) is out of the Black Sea, water generally flows in both directions simultaneously: Denser, more saline water from the Aegean flows into the Black Sea underneath the less dense, fresher water that flows out of the Black Sea. This creates a significant and permanent layer of deep water that does not drain or mix and is therefore anoxic. This anoxic layer is responsible for the preservation of ancient shipwrecks which have been found in the Black Sea.

The Black Sea ultimately drains into the Mediterranean Sea, via the Turkish Straits and the Aegean Sea. The Bosporus strait connects it to the small Sea of Marmara which in turn is connected to the Aegean Sea via the strait of the Dardanelles. To the north, the Black Sea is connected to the Sea of Azov by the Kerch Strait.

The water level has varied significantly over geological time. Due to these variations in the water level in the basin, the surrounding shelf and associated aprons have sometimes been dry land. At certain critical water levels, connections with surrounding water bodies can become established. It is through the most active of these connective routes, the Turkish Straits, that the Black Sea joins the world ocean. During geological periods when this hydrological link was not present, the Black Sea was an endorheic basin, operating independently of the global ocean system (similar to the Caspian Sea today). Currently, the Black Sea water level is relatively high; thus, water is being exchanged with the Mediterranean. The Black Sea undersea river is a current of particularly saline water flowing through the Bosporus Strait and along the seabed of the Black Sea, the first of its kind discovered.

Name

Modern names
Current names of the sea are usually equivalents of the English name "Black Sea", including these given in the countries bordering the sea:
 ,
 ,
 ,
 ,

 , shavi zghva
 Laz and , , or simply , , "Sea"
 ,
 ,
 ,
 ,

Such names have not yet been shown conclusively to predate the 13th century.

In Greece, the historical name "Euxine Sea", which holds a different meaning (see below), is still widely used:
, , lit. "Hospitable Sea"; the name  (), , lit. "Black Sea" is used, but is much less common.

Historical names and etymology
The earliest known name of the Black Sea is the Sea of Zalpa, so called by both the Hattians and their conquerors the Hittites. The Hattic city of Zalpa was "situated probably at or near the estuary of the Marrassantiya River, the modern Kızıl Irmak, on the Black Sea coast."

The principal Greek name Póntos Áxeinos is generally accepted to be a rendering of the Iranian word  ("dark coloured"). Ancient Greek voyagers adopted the name as , identified with the Greek word  (inhospitable). The name   (Inhospitable Sea), first attested in Pindar (), was considered an ill omen and was euphemized to its opposite,   (Hospitable Sea), also first attested in Pindar. This became the commonly used designation in Greek, although in mythological contexts the "true" name  remained favoured.

Strabo's Geographica (1.2.10) reports that in antiquity, the Black Sea was often simply called "the Sea" ( ). He thought that the sea was called the "Inhospitable Sea   by the inhabitants of the Pontus region of the southern shoreline before Greek colonisation due to its difficult navigation and hostile barbarian natives (7.3.6), and that the name was changed to "hospitable" after the Milesians colonised the region, bringing it into the Greek world.

Popular supposition derives "Black Sea" from the dark colour of the water or climatic conditions. Some scholars understand the name to be derived from a system of colour symbolism representing the cardinal directions, with black or dark for north, red for south, white for west, and green or light blue for east. Hence "Black Sea" meant "Northern Sea". According to this scheme, the name could only have originated with a people living between the northern (black) and southern (red) seas, pointing to the Achaemenids (550–330  BC), although Turkic peoples also marked the directions with colours.

In the Greater Bundahishn, a Middle Persian Zoroastrian scripture, the Black Sea is called . In the tenth-century Persian geography book , the Black Sea is called Georgian Sea (). The Georgian Chronicles use the name   (Sea of Speri) after the Kartvelian tribe of Speris or Saspers. Other modern names such as  and  (both meaning Black Sea) originated during the 13th century. A 1570 map  from Abraham Ortelius's  labels the sea  (Great Sea), compare Latin .

English writers of the 18th century often used Euxine Sea ( or ). During the Ottoman Empire, it was called either  or , both meaning "Black Sea" in Turkish, with the former consisting of Perso-Arabic .

Geography
The International Hydrographic Organization defines the limits of the Black Sea as follows:

The area surrounding the Black Sea is commonly referred to as the Black Sea Region. Its northern part lies within the Chernozem belt (black soil belt) which goes from eastern Croatia (Slavonia), along the Danube (northern Serbia, northern Bulgaria (Danubian Plain) and southern Romania (Wallachian Plain)) to northeast Ukraine and further across the Central Black Earth Region and southern Russia into Siberia.

The littoral zone of the Black Sea is often referred to as the Pontic littoral or Pontic zone.

The largest bays of the Black Sea are Karkinit Bay in Ukraine; the Gulf of Burgas in Bulgaria; Dnieprovski Bay and Dniestrovski Bay, both in Ukraine; and Sinop Bay and Samsun Bay, both in Turkey.

Coastline and exclusive economic zones

{| class="wikitable sortable" style="text-align:right;"
|+ Coastline length and area of exclusive economic zones
|-
!scope="col"| Country
!scope="col"| Coastline length (km)
!scope="col"| Exclusive economic zones area (km2)
|-
!scope="row"|
| 1,329
| 172,484
|-
!scope="row"|
| 2,782
| 132,414
|-
!scope="row"|
| 800
| 67,351
|-
!scope="row"|
| 354
| 35,132
|-
!scope="row"|
| 310
| 22,947
|-
!scope="row"|
| 225
| 29,756
|- class="sortbottom" style="background:#9acdff;"
!scope="row"| Total
| style="background:#9acdff; font-weight:bold;"| 5,800
| style="background:#9acdff; font-weight:bold;"| 460,084
|}

Drainage basin

The largest rivers flowing into the Black Sea are:

 Danube
 Dnieper
 Don
 Dniester
 Kızılırmak
 Kuban
 Sakarya
 Southern Bug
 Çoruh
 Yeşilırmak
 Rioni
 Yeya
 Mius
 Kamchiya
 Enguri
 Kalmius
 Molochna
 Tylihul
 Velykyi Kuialnyk
 Veleka
 Rezovo
 Kodori
 Bzyb
 Supsa
 Mzymta

These rivers and their tributaries comprise a  Black Sea drainage basin that covers wholly or partially 24 countries:

Islands
Some islands in the Black Sea belong to Bulgaria, Romania, Turkey, and Ukraine:

 St. Thomas Island – Bulgaria
 St. Anastasia Island – Bulgaria
 St. Cyricus Island – Bulgaria
 St. Ivan Island – Bulgaria
 St. Peter Island – Bulgaria
 Sacalinu Mare Island – Romania
 Sacalinu Mic Island – Romania
 Misura / Novaya Zemliya – Romania and Ukraine
 Utrish Island
 Krupinin Island
 Sudiuk Island
 Kefken Island
 Oreke Island
 Giresun Island - Turkey
 Dzharylgach Island – Ukraine
 Zmiinyi (Snake) Island – Ukraine

Climate

Short-term climatic variation in the Black Sea region is significantly influenced by the operation of the North Atlantic oscillation, the climatic mechanisms resulting from the interaction between the north Atlantic and mid-latitude air masses. While the exact mechanisms causing the North Atlantic Oscillation remain unclear, it is thought the climate conditions established in western Europe mediate the heat and precipitation fluxes reaching Central Europe and Eurasia, regulating the formation of winter cyclones, which are largely responsible for regional precipitation inputs and influence Mediterranean sea surface temperatures (SSTs).

The relative strength of these systems also limits the amount of cold air arriving from northern regions during winter. Other influencing factors include the regional topography, as depressions and storm systems arriving from the Mediterranean are funneled through the low land around the Bosporus, with the Pontic and Caucasus mountain ranges acting as waveguides, limiting the speed and paths of cyclones passing through the region.

Geology and bathymetry

The Black Sea is divided into two depositional basins—the Western Black Sea and Eastern Black Sea—separated by the Mid-Black Sea High, which includes the Andrusov Ridge, Tetyaev High, and Archangelsky High, extending south from the Crimean Peninsula. The basin includes two distinct relict back-arc basins which were initiated by the splitting of an Albian volcanic arc and the subduction of both the Paleo- and Neo-Tethys oceans, but the timings of these events remain uncertain. Arc volcanism and extension occurred as the Neo-Tethys Ocean subducted under the southern margin of Laurasia during the Mesozoic. Uplift and compressional deformation took place as the Neotethys continued to close. Seismic surveys indicate that rifting began in the Western Black Sea in the Barremian and Aptian followed by the formation of oceanic crust 20 million years later in the Santonian. Since its initiation, compressional tectonic environments led to subsidence in the basin, interspersed with extensional phases resulting in large-scale volcanism and numerous orogenies, causing the uplift of the Greater Caucasus, Pontides, southern Crimean Peninsula and Balkanides mountain ranges.

During the Messinian salinity crisis in the neighboring Mediterranean Sea, water levels fell but without drying up the sea. The collision between the Eurasian and African plates and the westward escape of the Anatolian block along the North Anatolian and East Anatolian faults dictates the current tectonic regime, which features enhanced subsidence in the Black Sea basin and significant volcanic activity in the Anatolian region. These geological mechanisms, in the long term, have caused the periodic isolations of the Black Sea from the rest of the global ocean system.

The large shelf to the north of the basin is up to  wide and features a shallow apron with gradients between 1:40 and 1:1000. The southern edge around Turkey and the eastern edge around Georgia, however, are typified by a narrow shelf that rarely exceeds  in width and a steep apron that is typically 1:40 gradient with numerous submarine canyons and channel extensions. The Euxine abyssal plain in the centre of the Black Sea reaches a maximum depth of  just south of Yalta on the Crimean Peninsula.

Chronostratigraphy
The Paleo-Euxinian is described by the accumulation of eolian silt deposits (related to the Riss glaciation) and the lowering of sea levels (MIS 6, 8 and 10). The Karangat marine transgression occurred during the Eemian Interglacial (MIS 5e). This may have been the highest sea levels reached in the late Pleistocene. Based on this some scholars have suggested that the Crimean Peninsula was isolated from the mainland by a shallow strait during the Eemian Interglacial.

The Neoeuxinian transgression began with an inflow of waters from the Caspian Sea. Neoeuxinian deposits are found in the Black Sea below  water depth in three layers. The upper layers correspond with the peak of the Khvalinian transgression, on the shelf shallow-water sands and coquina mixed with silty sands and brackish-water fauna, and inside the Black Sea Depression hydrotroilite silts. The middle layers on the shelf are sands with brackish-water mollusc shells. Of continental origin, the lower level on the shelf is mostly alluvial sands with pebbles, mixed with less common lacustrine silts and freshwater mollusc shells. Inside the Black Sea Depression they are terrigenous non-carbonate silts, and at the foot of the continental slope turbidite sediments.

Hydrology

The Black Sea is the world's largest body of water with a meromictic basin. The deep waters do not mix with the upper layers of water that receive oxygen from the atmosphere. As a result, over 90% of the deeper Black Sea volume is anoxic water. The Black Sea's circulation patterns are primarily controlled by basin topography and fluvial inputs, which result in a strongly stratified vertical structure. Because of the extreme stratification, it is classified as a salt wedge estuary.

The Black Sea experiences water transfer only with the Mediterranean Sea, so all inflow and outflow occurs through the Bosporus and Dardanelles. Inflow from the Mediterranean has a higher salinity and density than the outflow, creating the classic estuarine circulation. This means that the inflow of dense water from the Mediterranean occurs at the bottom of the basin while the outflow of fresher Black Sea surface-water into the Sea of Marmara occurs near the surface. According to Gregg (2002), the outflow is  or around , and the inflow is  or around .

The following water budget can be estimated:
 Water IN:
 Total river discharge:
 Precipitation:
 Inflow via Bosporus:
 Water OUT:
 Evaporation:  (reduced greatly since the 1970s)
 Outflow via Bosporus:

The southern sill of the Bosporus is located at  below present sea level (deepest spot of the shallowest cross-section in the Bosporus, located in front of Dolmabahçe Palace) and has a wet section of around . Inflow and outflow current speeds are averaged around , but much higher speeds are found locally, inducing significant turbulence and vertical shear. This allows for turbulent mixing of the two layers. Surface water leaves the Black Sea with a salinity of 17 practical salinity units (PSU) and reaches the Mediterranean with a salinity of 34 PSU. Likewise, an inflow of the Mediterranean with salinity 38.5 PSU experiences a decrease to about 34 PSU.

Mean surface circulation is cyclonic; waters around the perimeter of the Black Sea circulate in a basin-wide shelfbreak gyre known as the Rim Current. The Rim Current has a maximum velocity of about . Within this feature, two smaller cyclonic gyres operate, occupying the eastern and western sectors of the basin. The Eastern and Western Gyres are well-organized systems in the winter but dissipate into a series of interconnected eddies in the summer and autumn. Mesoscale activity in the peripheral flow becomes more pronounced during these warmer seasons and is subject to interannual variability.

Outside of the Rim Current, numerous quasi-permanent coastal eddies are formed as a result of upwelling around the coastal apron and "wind curl" mechanisms. The intra-annual strength of these features is controlled by seasonal atmospheric and fluvial variations. During the spring, the Batumi eddy forms in the southeastern corner of the sea.

Beneath the surface waters—from about —there exists a halocline that stops at the Cold Intermediate Layer (CIL). This layer is composed of cool, salty surface waters, which are the result of localized atmospheric cooling and decreased fluvial input during the winter months. It is the remnant of the winter surface mixed layer. The base of the CIL is marked by a major pycnocline at about , and this density disparity is the major mechanism for isolation of the deep water.

Below the pycnocline is the Deep Water mass, where salinity increases to 22.3 PSU and temperatures rise to around . The hydrochemical environment shifts from oxygenated to anoxic, as bacterial decomposition of sunken biomass utilizes all of the free oxygen. Weak geothermal heating and long residence time create a very thick convective bottom layer.

The Black Sea undersea river is a current of particularly saline water flowing through the Bosporus Strait and along the seabed of the Black Sea. The discovery of the river, announced on August 1, 2010, was made by scientists at the University of Leeds and is the first of its kind to be identified. The undersea river stems from salty water spilling through the Bosporus Strait from the Mediterranean Sea into the Black Sea, where the water has a lower salt content.

Hydrochemistry
Because of the anoxic water at depth, organic matter, including anthropogenic artifacts such as boat hulls, are well preserved. During periods of high surface productivity, short-lived algal blooms form organic rich layers known as sapropels. Scientists have reported an annual phytoplankton bloom that can be seen in many NASA images of the region. As a result of these characteristics the Black Sea has gained interest from the field of marine archaeology, as ancient shipwrecks in excellent states of preservation have been discovered, such as the Byzantine wreck Sinop D, located in the anoxic layer off the coast of Sinop, Turkey.

Modelling shows that, in the event of an asteroid impact on the Black Sea, the release of hydrogen sulfide clouds would pose a threat to health—and perhaps even life—for people living on the Black Sea coast.

There have been isolated reports of flares on the Black Sea occurring during thunderstorms, possibly caused by lightning igniting combustible gas seeping up from the sea depths.

Ecology

Marine

The Black Sea supports an active and dynamic marine ecosystem, dominated by species suited to the brackish, nutrient-rich, conditions. As with all marine food webs, the Black Sea features a range of trophic groups, with autotrophic algae, including diatoms and dinoflagellates, acting as primary producers. The fluvial systems draining Eurasia and central Europe introduce large volumes of sediment and dissolved nutrients into the Black Sea, but the distribution of these nutrients is controlled by the degree of physiochemical stratification, which is, in turn, dictated by seasonal physiographic development.

During winter, strong wind promotes convective overturning and upwelling of nutrients, while high summer temperatures result in a marked vertical stratification and a warm, shallow mixed layer. Day length and insolation intensity also control the extent of the photic zone. Subsurface productivity is limited by nutrient availability, as the anoxic bottom waters act as a sink for reduced nitrate, in the form of ammonia. The benthic zone also plays an important role in Black Sea nutrient cycling, as chemosynthetic organisms and anoxic geochemical pathways recycle nutrients which can be upwelled to the photic zone, enhancing productivity.

In total, the Black Sea's biodiversity contains around one-third of the Mediterranean's and is experiencing natural and artificial invasions or "Mediterranizations".

Phytoplankton

The main phytoplankton groups present in the Black Sea are dinoflagellates, diatoms, coccolithophores and cyanobacteria. Generally, the annual cycle of phytoplankton development comprises significant diatom and dinoflagellate-dominated spring production, followed by a weaker mixed assemblage of community development below the seasonal thermocline during summer months, and surface-intensified autumn production. This pattern of productivity is augmented by an Emiliania huxleyi bloom during the late spring and summer months.
 Dinoflagellates
 Annual dinoflagellate distribution is defined by an extended bloom period in subsurface waters during the late spring and summer. In November, subsurface plankton production is combined with surface production, due to vertical mixing of water masses and nutrients such as nitrite. The major bloom-forming dinoflagellate species in the Black Sea is Gymnodinium sp. Estimates of dinoflagellate diversity in the Black Sea range from 193 to 267 species. This level of species richness is relatively low in comparison to the Mediterranean Sea, which is attributable to the brackish conditions, low water transparency and presence of anoxic bottom waters. It is also possible that the low winter temperatures below  of the Black Sea prevent thermophilous species from becoming established. The relatively high organic matter content of Black Sea surface water favor the development of heterotrophic (an organism that uses organic carbon for growth) and mixotrophic dinoflagellates species (able to exploit different trophic pathways), relative to autotrophs. Despite its unique hydrographic setting, there are no confirmed endemic dinoflagellate species in the Black Sea.
 Diatoms
 The Black Sea is populated by many species of the marine diatom, which commonly exist as colonies of unicellular, non-motile auto- and heterotrophic algae. The life-cycle of most diatoms can be described as 'boom and bust' and the Black Sea is no exception, with diatom blooms occurring in surface waters throughout the year, most reliably during March. In simple terms, the phase of rapid population growth in diatoms is caused by the in-wash of silicon-bearing terrestrial sediments, and when the supply of silicon is exhausted, the diatoms begin to sink out of the photic zone and produce resting cysts. Additional factors such as predation by zooplankton and ammonium-based regenerated production also have a role to play in the annual diatom cycle. Typically,  blooms during spring and  blooms during the autumn.
 Coccolithophores
 Coccolithophores are a type of motile, autotrophic phytoplankton that produce CaCO3 plates, known as coccoliths, as part of their life cycle. In the Black Sea, the main period of coccolithophore growth occurs after the bulk of the dinoflagellate growth has taken place. In May, the dinoflagellates move below the seasonal thermocline into deeper waters, where more nutrients are available. This permits coccolithophores to utilize the nutrients in the upper waters, and by the end of May, with favorable light and temperature conditions, growth rates reach their highest. The major bloom-forming species is , which is also responsible for the release of dimethyl sulfide into the atmosphere. Overall, coccolithophore diversity is low in the Black Sea, and although recent sediments are dominated by  and , Holocene sediments have been shown to also contain Helicopondosphaera and Discolithina species.
 Cyanobacteria
 Cyanobacteria are a phylum of picoplanktonic (plankton ranging in size from 0.2 to 2.0 µm) bacteria that obtain their energy via photosynthesis, and are present throughout the world's oceans. They exhibit a range of morphologies, including filamentous colonies and biofilms. In the Black Sea, several species are present, and as an example, Synechococcus spp. can be found throughout the photic zone, although concentration decreases with increasing depth. Other factors which exert an influence on distribution include nutrient availability, predation, and salinity.

Animal species
 Zebra mussel
 The Black Sea along with the Caspian Sea is part of the zebra mussel's native range. The mussel has been accidentally introduced around the world and become an invasive species where it has been introduced.
 Common carp
 The common carp's native range extends to the Black Sea along with the Caspian Sea and Aral Sea. Like the zebra mussel, the common carp is an invasive species when introduced to other habitats.
 Round goby
 Another native fish that is also found in the Caspian Sea. It preys upon zebra mussels. Like the mussels and common carp, it has become invasive when introduced to other environments, like the Great Lakes in North America.
 Marine mammals and marine megafauna
 Marine mammals present within the basin include two species of dolphin (common and bottlenose) and the harbour porpoise, although all of these are endangered due to pressures and impacts by human activities. All three species have been classified as distinct subspecies from those in the Mediterranean and the Atlantic and are endemic to the Black and Azov seas, and are more active during nights in the Turkish Straits. However, construction of the Crimean Bridge has caused increases in nutrients and planktons in the waters, attracting large numbers of fish and more than 1,000 bottlenose dolphins. However, others claim that construction may cause devastating damages on the ecosystem, including dolphins.
 Mediterranean monk seals, now critically endangered, were historically abundant in the Black Sea, and are regarded to have become extinct from the basin in 1997. Monk seals were present at Snake Island, near the Danube Delta, until the 1950s, and several locations such as the  and Doğankent were the last of the seals' hauling-out sites post-1990. Very few animals still thrive in the Sea of Marmara.
 Ongoing Mediterranizations may or may not boost cetacean diversity in the Turkish Straits and hence in the Black and Azov basins.
 Various species of pinnipeds, sea otter, and beluga whale were introduced into the Black Sea by mankind and later escaped either by accidental or purported causes. Of these, grey seals and beluga whales have been recorded with successful, long-term occurrences.
 Great white sharks are known to reach into the Sea of Marmara and Bosporus Strait and basking sharks into the Dardanelles, although it is unclear whether or not these sharks may reach into the Black and Azov basins.

Ecological effects of pollution
Since the 1960s, rapid industrial expansion along the Black Sea coastline and the construction of a major dam has significantly increased annual variability in the N:P:Si ratio in the basin. In coastal areas, the biological effect of these changes has been an increase in the frequency of monospecific phytoplankton blooms, with diatom bloom frequency increasing by a factor of 2.5 and non-diatom bloom frequency increasing by a factor of 6. The non-diatoms, such as the prymnesiophytes  (coccolithophore),  sp., and the Euglenophyte , are able to out-compete diatom species because of the limited availability of silicon, a necessary constituent of diatom frustules. As a consequence of these blooms, benthic macrophyte populations were deprived of light, while anoxia caused mass mortality in marine animals.

The decline in macrophytes was further compounded by overfishing during the 1970s, while the invasive ctenophore Mnemiopsis reduced the biomass of copepods and other zooplankton in the late 1980s. Additionally, an alien species—the warty comb jelly ()—was able to establish itself in the basin, exploding from a few individuals to an estimated biomass of one billion metric tons. The change in species composition in Black Sea waters also has consequences for hydrochemistry, as calcium-producing coccolithophores influence salinity and pH, although these ramifications have yet to be fully quantified. In central Black Sea waters, silicon levels were also significantly reduced, due to a decrease in the flux of silicon associated with advection across isopycnal surfaces. This phenomenon demonstrates the potential for localized alterations in Black Sea nutrient input to have basin-wide effects.

Pollution reduction and regulation efforts have led to a partial recovery of the Black Sea ecosystem during the 1990s, and an EU monitoring exercise, 'EROS21', revealed decreased nitrogen and phosphorus values, relative to the 1989 peak. Recently, scientists have noted signs of ecological recovery, in part due to the construction of new sewage treatment plants in Slovakia, Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria in connection with membership in the European Union.  populations have been checked with the arrival of another alien species which feeds on them.

History

Mediterranean connection during the Holocene

The Black Sea is connected to the World Ocean by a chain of two shallow straits, the Dardanelles and the Bosporus. The Dardanelles is  deep, and the Bosporus is as shallow as . By comparison, at the height of the last ice age, sea levels were more than  lower than they are now.

There is evidence that water levels in the Black Sea were considerably lower at some point during the post-glacial period. Some researchers theorize that the Black Sea had been a landlocked freshwater lake (at least in upper layers) during the last glaciation and for some time after.

In the aftermath of the last glacial period, water levels in the Black Sea and the Aegean Sea rose independently until they were high enough to exchange water. The exact timeline of this development is still subject to debate. One possibility is that the Black Sea filled first, with excess freshwater flowing over the Bosporus sill and eventually into the Mediterranean Sea. There are also catastrophic scenarios, such as the "Black Sea deluge hypothesis" put forward by William Ryan, Walter Pitman and Petko Dimitrov.

Deluge hypothesis

The Black Sea deluge is a hypothesized catastrophic rise in the level of the Black Sea circa 5600 BC due to waters from the Mediterranean Sea breaching a sill in the Bosporus Strait. The hypothesis was headlined when The New York Times published it in December 1996, shortly before it was published in an academic journal. While it is agreed that the sequence of events described did occur, there is debate over the suddenness, dating, and magnitude of the events. Relevant to the hypothesis is that its description has led some to connect this catastrophe with prehistoric flood myths.

Recorded history

The Black Sea was a busy waterway on the crossroads of the ancient world: the Balkans to the west, the Eurasian steppes to the north, the Caucasus and Central Asia to the east, Asia Minor and Mesopotamia to the south, and Greece to the southwest.

The land at the eastern end of the Black Sea, Colchis (in present-day Georgia), marked for the ancient Greeks the edge of the known world.

The steppes to the north of the Black Sea is now generally accepted as the original homeland () of the speakers of the Proto-Indo-European language (PIE).

Greek presence in the Black Sea began at least as early as the 9th century BC with colonies scattered along the Black Sea's southern coast, attracting traders and colonists due to the grain grown in the Black Sea hinterland.
By 500 BC, permanent Greek communities existed all around the Black Sea, and a lucrative trade-network connected the entirety of the Black Sea to the wider Mediterranean. While Greek colonies generally maintained very close cultural ties to their founding polis, Greek colonies in the Black Sea began to develop their own Black Sea Greek culture, known today as Pontic. The coastal communities of Black Sea Greeks remained a prominent part of the Greek world for centuries, and the realms of Mithridates of Pontus, Rome and Constantinople spanned the Black Sea to include Crimean territories.

The Black Sea became a virtual Ottoman Navy lake within five years of the Republic of Genoa losing control of the Crimean Peninsula in 1479, after which the only Western merchant vessels to sail its waters were those of Venice's old rival Ragusa. Black sea became a trade route of slaves between Crimea and Ottoman Anatolia. This restriction was challenged by the Russian Navy from 1783 until the relaxation of export controls in 1789 because of the French Revolution.

The Black Sea was a significant naval theatre of World War I (1914-1918) and saw both naval and land battles between 1941 and 1945 during World War II. During the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Russian cruiser Moskva was sunk.

Archaeology

The Black Sea was sailed by Hittites, Carians, Colchians, Thracians, Greeks, Persians, Cimmerians, Scythians, Romans, Byzantines, Goths, Huns, Avars, Slavs, Varangians, Crusaders, Venetians, Genoese, Georgians, Bulgarians, Tatars and Ottomans.

The concentration of historical powers, combined with the preservative qualities of the deep anoxic waters of the Black Sea, has attracted increased interest from marine archaeologists who have begun to discover a large number of ancient ships and organic remains in a high state of preservation.

Economy and politics

The Black Sea plays an integral part in the connection between Asia and Europe. In addition to sea ports and fishing, key activities include hydrocarbons exploration for oil and natural gas, and tourism.

According to NATO, the Black Sea is a strategic corridor that provides smuggling channels for moving legal and illegal goods including drugs, radioactive materials, and counterfeit goods that can be used to finance terrorism.

Navigation
According to an International Transport Workers' Federation 2013 study, there were at least 30 operating merchant seaports in the Black Sea (including at least 12 in Ukraine). There were also around 2,400 commercial vessels operating in the Black Sea.

Fishing
The Turkish commercial fishing fleet catches around 300,000 tons of anchovies per year. The fishery is carried out mainly in winter, and the highest portion of the stock is caught between November and December.

Hydrocarbon exploration

In the 1980s, the Soviet Union started offshore drilling for petroleum in the sea's western portion (adjoining Ukraine's coast). Independent Ukraine continued and intensified that effort within its exclusive economic zone, inviting major international oil companies for exploration. Discovery of the new, massive oilfields in the area stimulated an influx of foreign investments. It also provoked a short-term peaceful territorial dispute with Romania which was resolved in 2011 by an international court redefining the exclusive economic zones between the two countries.

The Black Sea contains oil and natural gas resources but exploration in the sea is incomplete. , 20 wells are in place. Throughout much of its existence, the Black Sea has had significant oil and gas-forming potential because of significant inflows of sediment and nutrient-rich waters. However, this varies geographically. For example, prospects are poorer off the coast of Bulgaria because of the large influx of sediment from the Danube which obscured sunlight and diluted organic-rich sediments. Many of the discoveries to date have taken place offshore of Romania in the Western Black Sea and only a few discoveries have been made in the Eastern Black Sea.

During the Eocene, the Paratethys Sea was partially isolated and sea levels fell. During this time sand shed off the rising Balkanide, Pontide and Caucasus mountains trapped organic material in the Maykop Suite of rocks through the Oligocene and early Miocene. Natural gas appears in rocks deposited in the Miocene and Pliocene by the paleo-Dnieper and paleo-Dniester rivers, or in deep-water Oligocene-age rocks. Serious exploration began in 1999 with two deep-water wells, Limanköy-1 and Limanköy-2, drilled in Turkish waters. Next, the HPX (Hopa)-1 deepwater well targeted late Miocene sandstone units in Achara-Trialet fold belt (also known as the Gurian fold belt) along the Georgia-Turkey maritime border. Although geologists inferred that these rocks might have hydrocarbons that migrated from the Maykop Suite, the well was unsuccessful. No more drilling happened for five years after the HPX-1 well. Then in 2010, Sinop-1 targeted carbonate reservoirs potentially charged from the nearby Maykop Suite on the Andrusov Ridge, but the well-struck only Cretaceous volcanic rocks. Yassihöyük-1 encountered similar problems. Other Turkish wells, Sürmene-1 and Sile-1 drilled in the Eastern Black Sea in 2011 and 2015 respectively tested four-way closures above Cretaceous volcanoes, with no results in either case. A different Turkish well, Kastamonu-1 drilled in 2011 did successfully find thermogenic gas in Pliocene and Miocene shale-cored anticlines in the Western Black Sea. A year later in 2012, Romania drilled Domino-1 which struck gas prompting the drilling of other wells in the Neptun Deep. In 2016, the Bulgarian well Polshkov-1 targeted Maykop Suite sandstones in the Polshkov High and Russia is in the process of drilling Jurassic carbonates on the Shatsky Ridge as of 2018.

In August 2020, Turkey found  of natural gas in the biggest ever discovery in the Black Sea, and hoped to begin production in the Sakarya Gas Field by 2023. The sector is near where Romania has also found gas reserves.

Trans-sea cooperation

Urban areas

Tourism

In the years following the end of the Cold War, the popularity of the Black Sea as a tourist destination steadily increased. Tourism at Black Sea resorts became one of the region's growth industries.

The following is a list of notable Black Sea resort towns:

 2 Mai (Romania)
 Agigea (Romania)
 Ahtopol (Bulgaria)
 Amasra (Turkey)
 Anaklia (Georgia)
 Anapa (Russia)
 Albena (Bulgaria)
 Alupka (Crimea, Ukraine/Russia (disputed))
 Alushta (Crimea, Ukraine/Russia (disputed))
 Balchik (Bulgaria)
 Batumi (Georgia)
 Burgas (Bulgaria)
 Byala (Bulgaria)
 Cap Aurora (Romania)
 Chakvi (Georgia)
 Constanța (Romania)
 Constantine and Helena (Bulgaria)
 Corbu (Romania)
 Costinești (Romania)
 Eforie (Romania)
 Emona (Bulgaria)
 Eupatoria (Crimea, Ukraine/Russia (disputed))
 Feodosiya (Crimea, Ukraine/Russia (disputed))
 Foros (Crimea, Ukraine/Russia (disputed))
 Gagra (Abkhazia, Georgia)
 Gelendzhik (Russia)
 Giresun (Turkey)
 Golden Sands (Bulgaria)
 Gonio (Georgia)
 Gudauta (Abkhazia, Georgia) and subsequently the Gudauta Bay
 Gurzuf (Crimea, Ukraine/Russia (disputed))
 Hopa (Artvin, Turkey)
 Jupiter (Romania)
 Kamchia (Bulgaria)
 Kavarna (Bulgaria)
 Kiten (Bulgaria)
 Kobuleti (Georgia)
 Koktebel (Crimea, Ukraine/Russia (disputed))
 Lozenetz (Bulgaria)
 Mamaia (Romania)
 Mangalia (Romania)
 Năvodari (Romania)
 Neptun (Romania)
 Nesebar (Bulgaria)
 Novorossiysk (Russia)
 Obzor (Bulgaria)
 Odessa (Ukraine)
 Olimp (Romania)
 Ordu (Turkey)
 Pitsunda (Abkhazia, Georgia)
 Pomorie (Bulgaria)
 Primorsko (Bulgaria)
 Rize (Turkey)
 Rusalka (Bulgaria)
 Samsun (Turkey)
 Saturn (Romania)
 Şile (Turkey)
 Sinop (Turkey)
 Skadovsk (Ukraine)
 Sochi (Russia)
 Sozopol (Bulgaria)
 Sudak (Crimea, Ukraine/Russia (disputed))
 Sulina (Romania)
 Sunny Beach (Bulgaria)
 Sveti Vlas (Bulgaria)
 Trabzon (Turkey)
 Tsikhisdziri (Georgia)
 Tuapse (Russia)
 Ureki (Georgia)
 Vama Veche (Romania)
 Varna (Bulgaria)
 Venus (Romania)
 Yalta (Crimea, Ukraine/Russia (disputed))
 Zonguldak (Turkey)

Modern military use

The 1936 Montreux Convention provides for free passage of civilian ships between the international waters of the Black and the Mediterranean seas. However, a single country (Turkey) has complete control over the straits connecting the two seas. Military ships are categorised separately from civilian vessels and can pass through the straits only if the ship belongs to a Black Sea country. Other military ships have the right to pass through the straits if they are not in a war against Turkey and if they stay in the Black Sea basin for a limited time. The 1982 amendments to the Montreux Convention allow Turkey to close the straits at its discretion in both war and peacetime.

The Montreux Convention governs the passage of vessels between the Black, the Mediterranean and Aegean seas and the presence of military vessels belonging to non-littoral states in the Black Sea waters.

The Russian Black Sea Fleet has its official primary headquarters and facilities in the city of Sevastopol (Sevastopol Naval Base).

The Soviet hospital ship  was sunk on 7 November 1941 by German aircraft while evacuating civilians and wounded soldiers from Crimea. It has been estimated that approximately 5,000 to 7,000 people were killed during the sinking, making it one of the deadliest maritime disasters in history. There were only 8 survivors.

In December 2018, the Kerch Strait incident occurred, in which the Russian navy and coast guard took control of three Ukrainian vessels as the ships were trying to enter the Black Sea.

In April 2022, during the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Russian cruiser Moskva was sunk in the western Black Sea by sea-skimming Neptune missiles of the Ukrainian armed forces while the Russians claimed that an onboard fire had caused munitions to explode and damage the ship extensively. She was the largest ship to be lost in naval combat in Europe since World War II.

See also
 Sea of Azov
 Kerch Strait
 Regions of Europe
 1927 Crimean earthquakes

Notes and references

Informational notes

Citations

General bibliography

 Stella Ghervas, "Odessa et les confins de l'Europe: un éclairage historique", in Stella Ghervas et François Rosset (ed), Lieux d'Europe. Mythes et limites (Paris: Editions de la Maison des sciences de l'homme, 2008), pp. 107–124.
 Charles King, The Black Sea: A History, 2004,
 William Ryan and Walter Pitman, Noah's Flood, 1999,
 Neal Ascherson, Black Sea (Vintage 1996),

 Rüdiger Schmitt, "Considerations on the Name of the Black Sea", in: Hellas und der griechische Osten (Saarbrücken 1996), pp. 219–224

 Dimitrov, D. 2010. Geology and Non-traditional resources of the Black Sea . LAP Lambert Academic Publishing. . 244p.

External links

 Space Monitoring of the Black Sea Coastline and Waters
 Pictures of the Black sea coast all along the Crimean peninsula
 Black Sea Environmental Internet Node
 Black Sea-Mediterranean Corridor during the last 30 ky: UNESCO IGCP 521 WG12

Seas of the Mediterranean Sea
Anoxic waters
Back-arc basins
European seas
Seas of Russia
Seas of Turkey
Seas of Ukraine
Bodies of water of Bulgaria
Bodies of water of Georgia (country)
Bodies of water of Romania
Bodies of water of Crimea
Bulgaria–Romania border
Bulgaria–Turkey border
Georgia (country)–Russia border
Georgia (country)–Turkey border
Romania–Ukraine border
Russia–Ukraine border
Seas of the Atlantic Ocean
Seas of Asia
Geography of Southern Europe
Geography of Eastern Europe
Geography of Western Asia


We recently acquired a 6 year old wood Piantedosi track. Previous owners said it needs to be kept in controlled environment (whatever specifically that means). Micro Wizard says to keep it away from moisture. Cold will not hurt it. They no longer offer wood tracks.
Has anyone with a wood Piantedose track ever had their track damaged from where it was stored? Thank You.
Not a track, but lots of wood!
'controlled environment' usually means at room temperature and humidity. Not your attic, not your garage.
A large closet, where it can be stored flat would be best.
I think our cubmaster has stored our pack's Piantedosi wood track in his garage. It's probably 12-15 years old and in great shape. It's used twice a year, but boy is it used those days! Since we are north of the Mason Dixon line, it does get cold here in the winters. We do have lots of humidity, too, but not continually like near the shore. I'll verify with him how it is stored. I don't think he does anything special. It's probably been treated worse than specs state it should be, and it has weathered the temperature and humidity changes just fine.
Sorry, slow to reply here.
Our local pack uses this track, three lane. and they got it new, its about 10 years old now.
The things I see, as its stored in a really good box and had dividers between the sections of the tracks. this is key in my view to prevent wood sagging or the shape or waves in the wood happening.
Prior to this pack, another pack we once were with had a wooden track in the beginning and they did not store it right and that track only was 4 years old before they replaced it, due to waves in the wood.
Just stacking the lanes ontop of one another is not good enough, sagging on the sides ? and ends can happen.
The other pack, that had the better storage, had like wood and foam to it for each section of track, it's designed to be all level inside of the box. and it works well.
The foam fills the lanes, gaps between the rails, to allow even load pressure. because after you get it all in the box and its laying ontop of one another, thats allot more weight, then you think.
The main piece, that is bent for the race, seems to be the tricky one tho. because after the race, it has some arch in it and it does not like to lay flat when put back away.
But the box, is a tight fit and when the lid goes on and latched. it forces the main, section, the first piece, to lay back flat. Which at first I wondered if this was a good idea or better for it to retain more of the shape for when its installed.
But I have seen no ill effect from makign it lay flat in storage. the weights they add on, bring it to the right arch shape and over the years.
From one race to the previous years or past 3 years race. all the times seem to be very close to where they should be. often I kept track of the times and sometimes would bring the car back to run in open class, with very littl rework to it and it was always pretty close to the same times, it had run the prior year.
They also made sure as close and best they could to place the track in the same area of the gym floor. I think this also helped ensure, the times from the prior year all stayed close.
They used alignment jigs also, in how they put the sections together. a piece that you mount over two sections with clamps. then screwed the sections together. this played a good part in things aswell.
The worst thing I see, if its very hard to keep these tracks clean, they often used pledge before and after the race and rags to try and get it all up.
It does not work very well, but thats what they go with. the key issue one year, they did the pledge 1 hour before the race and did not get it wiped off good enough.
Thus the first three rounds were off in times, before it started to be like it usually was. which I felt bad because the track times got faster for everyone, but those first 3 rounds, hurt those racers. because they run so many times and there times are what is used to determine the winners.
They run 9 times. but 6 of there runs were slower, then there last three and this was for a large portion of the people in those first three runs.
They felt bad, and were awhare of it after the race started, but did not do anything.
I know added tid bits, but I thought, this is a example of be carefull when cleaing the track and how soon you will run on it, it can effect times, if its not all removed.
STORAGE: The track should be stored in it's original shipping carton. It is not necessary to remove the support legs from section I, they will fold flat. It is necessary to remove the starting gate. Take care when tightening and loosening these four wood screws. The carton should be stored flat and level. If placed on a rack it should be supported in the middle as well as each end. If storage is to be on a cement floor it would be necessary to block it up at least six inches; cardboard and wood will draw moisture right through concrete.
The "original shipping carton" is nothing special; it is just a long cardboard box with some extra packaging in the ends to protect the track edges. We store our sections stacked flat in a case built similar to Microwizard's plans.


text:
Trump Shrinks Two National Monuments
The decision significantly reduces public land designated by prior presidents.
Lena Felton
Andrew Cullen / Reuters
On Monday afternoon, President Trump signed two presidential proclamations that will reduce the boundaries of Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante, two national monuments located in Utah. Never before has a president reduced a national-monument designation made by a predecessor by such large margins.
"I've come to Utah to take a very historic action, to reverse federal overreach and restore the rights of this land to your citizens," President Trump told a crowd at the Utah State Capitol in Salt Lake City.
According to leaked documents, Trump's proposal would shrink the 1.32-million-acre Bears Ears monument, designated by President Barack Obama in 2016, by about 85 percent. Grand Staircase-Escalante, which was designated by Bill Clinton in 1996, would be reduced by about 50 percent.
Bears Ears has been a point of contention between Utah lawmakers and environmental groups ever since Obama designated it at the end of his presidency. Utah Senator Orrin Hatch has long been campaigning to reduce the size of the monuments, citing federal overreach as well as the possibility for economic development of the land.
A few months after taking office, President Trump ordered Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke to review 27 national monuments. Zinke later suggested shrinking or modifying 10, including Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante.
Is America's 'Best Idea' at Stake?
In his speech on Monday, Trump cited "past administrations" as having "severely abused the purpose and spirit and intent of a centuries-old law known as the Antiquities Act." That act, signed in 1906 by Theodore Roosevelt, gives presidents the unilateral power to protect public land—but nowhere does it explicitly grant the president power to reduce or remove previous designations. On these grounds, several environmental groups have promised to bring lawsuits if Trump followed through on Zinke's recommendations.
Now that Trump has taken an overt action to do so, all eyes will be on whether or not the courts will allow the president to reduce previous designations. The outcome will set the new precedent for the country's approach to public lands; and, according to the law professor Mark Squillace, could render the Antiquities Act a "punching bag among presidents going forward."
According to other historians, the president's actions may not have far-reaching implications when it comes to actual policy. "It's one thing for a president to say, 'I'm going to do this,'" said the historian Michael Kraft. "It's quite another to look back another three years later and say, 'What actually happened?'"

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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text:
Inglés (pdf)
Latin american journal of aquatic research
versión On-line ISSN 0718-560X
Lat. Am. J. Aquat. Res. vol.39 no.2 Valparaíso jul. 2011
Lat. Am. J. Aquat. Res., 39(2): 197-204, 2011
DOI: 10.3856/vol39-issue2-fiilltext-1
Efficacy of marine green alga Ulva fasciata extract on the management of shrimp bacterial diseases
Eficacia del extracto del alga marina verde Ulva fasciata sobre el manejo de las enfermedades bacterianas en camarones
Joseph Selvin1, Aseer Manilal2, Suganthan Sujith3, George Seghal Kiran4 & Aron Premnath Lipton5
1-4Department of Microbiology, Bharathidasan University Tiruchirappalli - 620 024, India
5Centre for Marine Science and Technology, M.S. University Rajakkamankalam Kanyakumari District, India
ABSTRACT. Secondary metabolites of the green algae, Ulva fasciata, were tested to determine the efficacy of controlling shrimp bacterial pathogens. Exploratory experiments indicated that an intermediate dose (1 g kg-1 of shrimp) of Ulva in the diet was highly effective at controlling bacterial pathogens of shrimp, as compared to lower (500 mg kg-1) and higher (1.5 g kg-1) doses. The pilot experiments evaluated the percent of relative protection afforded shrimps treated with Ulva diet and faced with various concentrations of bacterial pathogen. The survival of shrimps treated with Ulva diet was significant (P < 0.01). The present findings indicate that the green U. fasciata may be an excellent source for developing a potent medicated feed for shrimp disease management.
Keywords: Penaeus monodon, bacterial diseases, Vibrio, shell disease, proactive management, Ulva fasciata.
RESUMEN. Metabolites secundario de algas verdes Ulva fasciata fue probado para determinar la eficacia de controlar el camarón pathogens bacterial. Las conclusiones de experimentos exploratorios indicaron que la dosis mediana (1 g kg-1 de camarón) de dieta Ulva era sumamente eficaz en el control de pathogens bacterial de camarón cuando comparado al más abajo (500 mg kg-1) y más alto (1,5 g kg-1) dosis. En los experimentos pilotos, la protección de pariente de por ciento de camarones trató con la dieta Ulva y desafió con varias concentraciones de bacterial patógeno fueron evaluados. La supervivencia de camarones trató con la dieta Ulva era significativo (P < 0,01). Basado en las conclusiones presentes, podría ser deducido que U. verde fasciata puede ser una fuente excelente para desarrollar la comida potente medicinal para la dirección de enfermedad de camarón.
Palabras clave: Penaeus monodon, enfermedades bacteriales, Vibrio, enfermedad de cáscara, dirección proactiva, Ulva fasciata.
Bacterial disease outbreaks particularly vibriosis and black shell disease impose a significant constraint on the sustainable production of shrimp (Bachere et al., 1995; Verschuere et al., 2000; Selvin et al., 2005; Manilal et al., 2010b). In Asia, among the pathogenic Vibrio group, 11 species were reported from the shrimp culture systems (Lavilla-Pitogo, 1995). V. alginolyticus and V. harveyi poses a serious disease problem in cultured black tiger shrimp in India (Karunasagar et al., 1997; Selvin & Lipton 2003a; Manilal et al., 2010b). Vibrio species are considered to be members of the normal bacterial flora of shrimp and the culture environment (Jiravanichpaisal et al., 1994; Otta et al., 1999). Often acting as opportunistic pathogens or secondary invaders, they may cause total mortality of reared shrimps (Lightner, 1988; Nash et al., 1992).
Although few reports evidenced the efficacy of algae-based products in shrimp health management (Furusawa et al., 1991; Yamasaki et al., 1997), the role of marine natural product in shrimp disease management has been realized recently (Selvin & Lipton, 2003, 2004; Selvin et al. 2004b; Huang et al., 2006; Manilal et al., 2009). It was found that marine secondary metabolites are promising resources for the development of eco-friendly management practices for shrimp diseases (Selvin & Lipton, 2003; Selvin et al., 2004, 2004b; Manilal et al., 2009, 2009a). Moreover, secondary metabolites of green algae Ulva fasciata elicited the non-specific defense factors of shrimp against pathogenic invaders (Selvin, 2002; Selvin et al., 2004b). In addition, medicated feed formulated with polysaccharides isolated from the Indian green algae, Acrosiphonia orientalis were found to be effective in control of White Spot Syndrome Virus (Manilal et al., 2009). Recently, Huang et al. (2006) envisages the effect of Sargassum fusiforme polysaccharide extracts on vibriosis resistance and immune activity of the shrimp, Fenneropenaeus chinensis.
Southwest coast of India is a unique marine habitat infested with diverse variety of seaweeds. The biological activity of seaweeds from the southwest coast of India (Kollam coast) is already reported (Manilal et al., 2009, 2009a, 2009b, 2010, 2010a, 2011, 2011a). In this background, the present study aims to establish the effect of algal-based medicated feed on the survival of experimentally infected shrimps.
Collection of marine algae
The mature plants of Ulva fasciata was handpicked from the intertidal and subtidal habitat of the Kollam (08°54N, 76°38'E) area located on the southwestern coast of India. The collection was performed during the period from June 2007 to August 2007 when algal biomass remains dominant. Live and healthy plants were harvested manually and washed thoroughly in running water. Cleaned plant materials were shade dried under an air jet to prevent photolysis and thermal degradation. The completely dried material was weighed and ground coarsely in a mechanical grinder (Manilal et al., 2010).
Extraction of algae
For extraction, 500 g of finely powdered algal material was refluxed three times in a 5 L capacity round bottom flask in a water bath at 65°C for about 6 h using dichloromethane: methanol (1:1) as a binary azeotropic solvent (Manilal et al., 2009b). The extracts were filtered and concentrated to recover the excess solvents in another distillation system. The concentrated extract (about 100 mL) was again filtered through a Whatman N°1 filter paper fitted with a Buchner funnel using suction pressure.
Finally, it was reduced to thick oily natured crude extract in a rotary vacuum evaporator (Yamato) at 40°C, collected in air-tight plastic vials and stored in the refrigerator for further activity studies.
Determination of median lethal dose (MLD) of algal extract
Primary exploratory (dose selecting) experiments were conducted with broad range of the test compounds. Chosen concentrations such as: 100, 1000 and 2000 mg kg-1 shrimp of U. fasciata extract were prepared in 5% EtOH in normal saline to ensure complete solubility. Ten shrimps (abw = 8.5 g) per group (triplicates) were injected intra-muscularly with 0.1 mL of appropriate dose or 5% EtOH in normal saline (control). The immediate reflexes and mortality were observed every hour for the first 6 h and every 24 h for 7 days. Based on the exploratory experiments, narrow ranges were administered to the experimental shrimp to determine the median lethal dose (LD50).
Preparation of medicated diet
Top-coated medicated feed was prepared with appropriate quantity of Ulva extract on the surface of the feed at a rate of 3.2% of the shrimp body weight daily. To prepare the medicated feed, 30, 60 and 80 g of Ulva extract was incorporated in medicated diet. The shrimp were fed with a commercially formulated shrimp feed with the following proximate composition: 35.6% crude protein, 3.5% lipids, 5.9% fibre, 45.7% nitrogen-free extract and 11.21% ash. Commercial pellet shrimp grower feed No. 1 (C.P. feeds, Cochin) was used for preparing medicated feed for the experiments on leaching of Ulva extract in the water. The extract was dissolved in 50 mL of 4% gelatin water and sprayed on 1 kg of pellet feed using a TLC sprayer. The sprayed medicated feed was dried in a hot air oven at 40°C.
Pathogenicity and LD50 value of shrimp pathogens
Initially, the slant culture of shrimp pathogens (V. fischeri, V. alginolyticus, V. harveyi and Aeromonas sp.) was activated and 1 mL of 18 h culture was inoculated in 25 mL nutrient broth. This was kept overnight at 30 ± 2°C in a shaker at 180 ± 5 rpm. An 18 h shake culture was centrifuged at 4800 x g for 15 min at 40°C (Eppendorf). Cell pellets were washed twice with normal saline (NS), re-suspended and serially diluted in NS and enumerated using a Petroff-Hausser counting chamber by plating on nutrient agar supplemented with 2% NaCl (Himedia). This was also plated on nutrient agar to get the colony forming units (cfu) values. The black tiger shrimp Penaeus monodon post-larvae (PL-20) obtained from the Matsyafed hatchery, Kollam and were reared in a 1000 L fiber reinforced plastic tanks provided with constant aeration and 50% daily water exchange. They were reared at optimum hydrological conditions such as salinity (35 ppt), temperature (30 ± 2°C) and pH (7.8). Healthy juveniles (average body weight = 5.4 ± 2.2 g) were segregated and maintained at 20 shrimps/tank in 200 L high-density plastic (HDP) tanks before starting the experiment. The challenged shrimps were maintained at 10 shrimps/tanks in glass aquaria. Shrimps were intramuscularly injected with 0.1 mL of bacterial inoculums using a 1 mL tuberculin syringe at ventral side between the second and third segment. Preliminary examinations revealed that challenge dose of 103 colony forming unit (cfu) per shrimp could not kill the injected shrimp (Manilal et al., 2010b). Therefore the concentrations of 105 to 108 cfu of the appropriate single (V. fischeri, V. alginolyticus, V. harveyi and Aeromonas sp.) and combined culture (V. alginolyticus + V. harveyi) of bacteria per shrimp were used. Parallel control groups received 0.1 mL of normal saline (NS) only. Ten shrimps were used for each inoculation level. The mortality and reflexes of the shrimps were observed for every 15 min in the first hour of post-inoculation and every 1 h until the 6th h (Manilal et al., 2010b). Subsequent monitoring was done every 12 h for a period of seven days (Tendencia & Dureza, 1997). The appropriate concentration of pathogens (105 to 108 cfu), which causes mortality within 24 h or within 7 days, was considered as LD50 whereas which causes infection or abnormalities was considered as ID50 (Infectivity Dose) (Manilal et al., 2010b). The LD50 dose was calculated by the probit method, after Wardlaw (1985).
Effect of different dose of algal extracts in the survival of experimentally infected shrimps
The shrimps with an average body weight of 5.6 ± 1.8 g range were reared in the circular high density plastic (HDP) tanks at a stocking density of 60 individuals per 600 L of seawater. They were fed with Ulva diet (1 g kg-1 shrimp) in three equal installments at a rate of 3.2% of their body weight for a period of 15 days. On the 16th day, three duplicate groups each of treated shrimps (10 numbers/group) were grouped in to three and intramuscularly injected with LD50 (106 cfu/shrimp) challenge dose and higher challenge dose (107 to 108 cfu/shrimp) of single culture of bacterial pathogens such as V. fischeri, V. harveyi, V. algino-lyticus and Aeromonas sp., and combined culture of pathogen (V. harveyi, 5 x 105 + V. alginolyticus, 5 x 105 = 106 cfu/shrimp) and transferred to the 100 L glass aquaria. They were observed for a period of 15 days for mortality and external clinical symptoms (Austin & Austin, 1989). The Ulva diet was continued after challenge for 15 days. Parallel control shrimps (10 numbers) received 0.1 mL normal saline only. The mortality/infectivity percentages were estimated according to Sung et al. (1994). The Percent Relative Protection (PRP) was determined by the following expression:
To determine if significant differences existed between the treated and control shrimps, all results were analyzed using ANOVA. The significant differences were indicated at P < 0.01.
The Median Lethal Dose (MLD) of Ulva extract in P. monodon was determined to be 1120 mg kg-1 shrimp. During the preliminary experiment, the infection (pathogenicity range) was obtained at a higher dose of 108 cfu/shrimp after 5 days of inoculation with luminescent V. fischeri type culture. The LD50 values of bacterial pathogens were ran6ged as 2.8 x 107 cfu/shrimp for V. fischeri and 106 cfu/shrimp for V. harveyi, V. alginolyticus and Aeromonas sp. The external clinical symptoms were characterized as 'shell necrosis' and 'black spots' on the shell, necrotised chelate legs, anorexia, feeble movement and mortality.
The effect of different algal extracts in the survival of experimentally infected shrimp is presented in Table 1. The shrimp fed with the dose rate of 500-mg kg-1 shrimp had the lowest protection against bacterial infection. At this dose, the shrimp challenged with V. fischeri produced infection in 60% of challenged shrimp, whereas the shrimp challenged with V. harveyi and V. alginolyticus caused infection to the extent of 80%. The experimental group, fed with median (1 g kg-1 shrimp) and higher (1.5 g kg-1 shrimp) doses of medicated feed exhibited more or less similar level of protection. At these treatment levels, no mortality was noticed in the shrimps challenged with V. harveyi and Aeromonas sp. whereas V. fischeri and V. alginolyticus caused 20% infection. The infected shrimps showed external clinical symptoms such as 'shell necrosis' and 'black spots' on the shell. Subsequent symptoms such as necrotised chelate legs, anorexia, feeble movement were culminated in mortality, particularly in control and lower treatments. Based on these findings, it could be envisaged that shrimp fed with 1 g kg-1 will provide high protection compared to other doses.
The survival rate of treated and control shrimp against various bacterial pathogens is depicted in Figures 1 to 4. The shrimps challenged with potentiated pathogen produced more infection or mortality in the treated group than those caused by the LD50 value of individual pathogen. In the case of V. fischeri, the LD50 did not cause mortality in the treated group while all the control shrimp died (Fig. 1). Ulva diet elicited significant survival (60 in terms of PRP) against the lethal dose (108 cfu/shrimp) of V. fischeri. However 20% infection was observed among the surviving shrimp of Ulva fed group (Table 2). The Ulva diet elicited complete protection (100% survival) against the infection of V. harveyi and V. alginolyticus. The inoculation of a higher dose (107 cfu/shrimp) of Aeromonas sp. caused 40% infection in the Ulva treated group (Table 2). It was found that the Ulva diet produced a higher level of protection (80% survival) against the infection caused by the combined pathogens. Invariably, the survival of treated shrimp against the bacterial infection was significant at P < 0.01 level (Table 2).
Based on the findings, shrimp fed with Ulva-based medicated feed at a dose rate of 1 g kg-1 could effectively control the bacterial pathogens challenged in this study. Invariably the shrimp treated and challenged subsequently with the LD50 of appropriate bacteria gave higher survival than the control group. In the control group, early high mortality was observed than the actual LD50. It may be due to the enhanced virulence obtained by the pathogenic isolates passed through the host, prior to the 'in captivity' control experiments. The treated group challenged with higher dose (107 to 108 cfu/shrimp) of bacterial inoculum had low survival. The survival rate of Ulva treated shrimp was 100% against the infection caused by the shrimp bacterial pathogens. Selvin et al. (2004b) reported that inhibition of bacterial propagation was a possible mechanism by which Ulva medication provided protection from infection.
Shrimp disease management using Ulva diet was proven to be an effective eco-friendly management strategy for sustainable shrimp farming (Selvin, 2002; Selvin & Lipton, 2003). Ulva diet was found to be a potent immunomodulator and therefore it was considered as a proactive drug (Selvin et al., 2004b). As per our earlier finding, 88% of viable V. fischeri cells were cleared-off from the haemolymph within 1 h in the Ulva treated group. These findings suggest the quick production of bactericidins in the haemolymph of Ulva treated group. The rapid bacterial clearance rate of shrimp haemocytes was stimulated by Ulva treatment. Therefore it was conjectured that bacteridins found in shrimp plasma might be inducibly released from haemocytes by Ulva medication. Recently Huang et al. (2006) reported the effect of seaweed Sargassum fusiforme polysaccharide extracts on vibriosis resistance and immune activity of the treated shrimp. Literature also evidenced the in vivo antiviral (WSSV) potency of seaweed-based medicated feed in Penaeus monodon (Manilal et al., 2009). Satoh et al. (1987) investigated the effect of Ulva on susceptibility of infectious disease in red sea bream Pagrus major fed with 5% Ulva pertusa meal supplementation diet. The Ulva meal increased the resistance against infection caused by Pasteurella piscicida. A spray-dried preparation of micro-algae Tetraselmis suecica was reported to control a variety of fish pathogens such as A. salmonicida, Staphylococcus liquifaciens, V. anguillarum, V. salmonicida and V. ruckeri (Austin & Day, 1990).
Based on the present study, therapeutic formulation (Ulva diet) can be easily prepared with crude extract. Therefore purification strategies and consequent synthetic analogue development process need not be undertaken. As the extract was prepared from the dried material, such source material can easily be stored for 12 months. To sustain the host-defense system and relative protection against pathogenic invaders, the Ulva medication can be used as a prophylactic agent for the entire culture period at low cost. Based on the present findings, it could be inferred that the secondary metabolites of U. fasciata form an excellent source for developing potent formulations as a package of proactive management practice for sustainable shrimp farming.
The author Aseer Manilal is gratefully acknowledged Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), New Delhi for providing Senior Research Fellowship. This work is funded by Department of Biotechnology, New Delhi (BT/PR8064/AAQ/03/290/2006).
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Received: 14 March 2010; Accepted: 13 April 2011
Corresponding author: Aseer Manilal (aseermanilal@gmail.com)
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