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International audience ; Deep-sea environments in the Mediterranean Sea have been widely degraded over the past decades and thus there is an urgent need to implement protection measures. Within European Union's Mediterranean waters vast extensions of the deep-sea ecologically relevant ecosystems have been protected by integrating them to the Natura 2000 network. Inside the French Exclusive Economic Zone, this network is currently expanding to off-shore areas, beyond 12 nautical miles. In this study, we characterized megabenthic biodiversity on target features located inside a designed site of the south west Corsican margin, particularly on a volcanic promontory on the south flank of the Ajaccio submarine canyon and a wall of the Valinco Canyon, between 1690 and 2250 m depth. By means of a fine scale three-dimensional photogrammetric analysis, four megabenthic assemblages segregated by substrate were identified. Hard substrate assemblages were characterized by the presence of sponges, polychaetes, gastropods and the squat lobster Munida tenuimana while soft sediment assemblages were characterized by the elpidiid holothurian Penilpidia ludwigi and an unidentified sabellid. Highest densities were registered on serpulid thanatocoenoses, which hosted widespread patches of an unidentified encrusting sponge. Lebensspuren had a diverse origin likely deriving from the activity of epibenthic, infaunal and bathypelagic organisms. In general, litter was not abundant at these offshore sites: in the Valinco site, it had both a marine and land-based origin while at the even more offshore Ajaccio site, it was mainly marine based. More extensive surveys would be advisable to confirm this trend. This study provides new insight on the ecology and diversity of Mediterranean deep-sea environments in the 2000 m bathymetric zone, highlighting the enduring knowledge gap surrounding orographically complex deep-sea escarpments in the basin.

International audience ; Deep-sea environments in the Mediterranean Sea have been widely degraded over the past decades and thus there is an urgent need to implement protection measures. Within European Union's Mediterranean waters vast extensions of the deep-sea ecologically relevant ecosystems have been protected by integrating them to the Natura 2000 network. Inside the French Exclusive Economic Zone, this network is currently expanding to off-shore areas, beyond 12 nautical miles. In this study, we characterized megabenthic biodiversity on target features located inside a designed site of the south west Corsican margin, particularly on a volcanic promontory on the south flank of the Ajaccio submarine canyon and a wall of the Valinco Canyon, between 1690 and 2250 m depth. By means of a fine scale three-dimensional photogrammetric analysis, four megabenthic assemblages segregated by substrate were identified. Hard substrate assemblages were characterized by the presence of sponges, polychaetes, gastropods and the squat lobster Munida tenuimana while soft sediment assemblages were characterized by the elpidiid holothurian Penilpidia ludwigi and an unidentified sabellid. Highest densities were registered on serpulid thanatocoenoses, which hosted widespread patches of an unidentified encrusting sponge. Lebensspuren had a diverse origin likely deriving from the activity of epibenthic, infaunal and bathypelagic organisms. In general, litter was not abundant at these offshore sites: in the Valinco site, it had both a marine and land-based origin while at the even more offshore Ajaccio site, it was mainly marine based. More extensive surveys would be advisable to confirm this trend. This study provides new insight on the ecology and diversity of Mediterranean deep-sea environments in the 2000 m bathymetric zone, highlighting the enduring knowledge gap surrounding orographically complex deep-sea escarpments in the basin.

International audience ; Deep-sea environments in the Mediterranean Sea have been widely degraded over the past decades and thus there is an urgent need to implement protection measures. Within European Union's Mediterranean waters vast extensions of the deep-sea ecologically relevant ecosystems have been protected by integrating them to the Natura 2000 network. Inside the French Exclusive Economic Zone, this network is currently expanding to off-shore areas, beyond 12 nautical miles. In this study, we characterized megabenthic biodiversity on target features located inside a designed site of the south west Corsican margin, particularly on a volcanic promontory on the south flank of the Ajaccio submarine canyon and a wall of the Valinco Canyon, between 1690 and 2250 m depth. By means of a fine scale three-dimensional photogrammetric analysis, four megabenthic assemblages segregated by substrate were identified. Hard substrate assemblages were characterized by the presence of sponges, polychaetes, gastropods and the squat lobster Munida tenuimana while soft sediment assemblages were characterized by the elpidiid holothurian Penilpidia ludwigi and an unidentified sabellid. Highest densities were registered on serpulid thanatocoenoses, which hosted widespread patches of an unidentified encrusting sponge. Lebensspuren had a diverse origin likely deriving from the activity of epibenthic, infaunal and bathypelagic organisms. In general, litter was not abundant at these offshore sites: in the Valinco site, it had both a marine and land-based origin while at the even more offshore Ajaccio site, it was mainly marine based. More extensive surveys would be advisable to confirm this trend. This study provides new insight on the ecology and diversity of Mediterranean deep-sea environments in the 2000 m bathymetric zone, highlighting the enduring knowledge gap surrounding orographically complex deep-sea escarpments in the basin.

International audience ; Deep-sea environments in the Mediterranean Sea have been widely degraded over the past decades and thus there is an urgent need to implement protection measures. Within European Union's Mediterranean waters vast extensions of the deep-sea ecologically relevant ecosystems have been protected by integrating them to the Natura 2000 network. Inside the French Exclusive Economic Zone, this network is currently expanding to off-shore areas, beyond 12 nautical miles. In this study, we characterized megabenthic biodiversity on target features located inside a designed site of the south west Corsican margin, particularly on a volcanic promontory on the south flank of the Ajaccio submarine canyon and a wall of the Valinco Canyon, between 1690 and 2250 m depth. By means of a fine scale three-dimensional photogrammetric analysis, four megabenthic assemblages segregated by substrate were identified. Hard substrate assemblages were characterized by the presence of sponges, polychaetes, gastropods and the squat lobster Munida tenuimana while soft sediment assemblages were characterized by the elpidiid holothurian Penilpidia ludwigi and an unidentified sabellid. Highest densities were registered on serpulid thanatocoenoses, which hosted widespread patches of an unidentified encrusting sponge. Lebensspuren had a diverse origin likely deriving from the activity of epibenthic, infaunal and bathypelagic organisms. In general, litter was not abundant at these offshore sites: in the Valinco site, it had both a marine and land-based origin while at the even more offshore Ajaccio site, it was mainly marine based. More extensive surveys would be advisable to confirm this trend. This study provides new insight on the ecology and diversity of Mediterranean deep-sea environments in the 2000 m bathymetric zone, highlighting the enduring knowledge gap surrounding orographically complex deep-sea escarpments in the basin.

International audience ; Deep-sea environments in the Mediterranean Sea have been widely degraded over the past decades and thus there is an urgent need to implement protection measures. Within European Union's Mediterranean waters vast extensions of the deep-sea ecologically relevant ecosystems have been protected by integrating them to the Natura 2000 network. Inside the French Exclusive Economic Zone, this network is currently expanding to off-shore areas, beyond 12 nautical miles. In this study, we characterized megabenthic biodiversity on target features located inside a designed site of the south west Corsican margin, particularly on a volcanic promontory on the south flank of the Ajaccio submarine canyon and a wall of the Valinco Canyon, between 1690 and 2250 m depth. By means of a fine scale three-dimensional photogrammetric analysis, four megabenthic assemblages segregated by substrate were identified. Hard substrate assemblages were characterized by the presence of sponges, polychaetes, gastropods and the squat lobster Munida tenuimana while soft sediment assemblages were characterized by the elpidiid holothurian Penilpidia ludwigi and an unidentified sabellid. Highest densities were registered on serpulid thanatocoenoses, which hosted widespread patches of an unidentified encrusting sponge. Lebensspuren had a diverse origin likely deriving from the activity of epibenthic, infaunal and bathypelagic organisms. In general, litter was not abundant at these offshore sites: in the Valinco site, it had both a marine and land-based origin while at the even more offshore Ajaccio site, it was mainly marine based. More extensive surveys would be advisable to confirm this trend. This study provides new insight on the ecology and diversity of Mediterranean deep-sea environments in the 2000 m bathymetric zone, highlighting the enduring knowledge gap surrounding orographically complex deep-sea escarpments in the basin.

9 pages, 1 figure, 1 table ; Deep-water ecosystems are characterized by relatively low carbonate concentration values and, due to ocean acidification (OA), these habitats might be among the first to be exposed to undersaturated conditions in the forthcoming years. However, until now, very few studies have been conducted to test how cold-water coral (CWC) species react to such changes in the seawater chemistry. The present work aims to investigate the mid-term effect of decreased pH on calcification of the two branching CWC species most widely distributed in the Mediterranean, Lophelia pertusa and Madrepora oculata. No significant effects were observed in the skeletal growth rate, microdensity and porosity of both species after 6 months of exposure. However, while the calcification rate of M. oculata was similar for all colony fragments, a heterogeneous skeletal growth pattern was observed in L. pertusa, the younger nubbins showing higher growth rates than the older ones. A higher energy demand is expected in these young, fast-growing fragments and, therefore, a reduction in calcification might be noticed earlier during long-term exposure to acidified conditions. © 2013 by the authors ; This research was supported by the European Project HERMIONE (grant agreement number 226354), the Spanish Government (MINECO) projects ACDC (CTM2009-08849/MAR) and MANIFEST (CTM2012-32017) and by the Marine Biogeochemistry and Global Change research group (Generalitat de Catalunya, 2009SGR142). JM was funded by a FPI studentship (BES-2007-16537) and AG by an I3P studentship (I3P-BPD2005) from the Spanish Government ; Peer Reviewed

23 pages, 14 figures, 5 tables ; Imaging technologies are being deployed on cabled observatory networks worldwide. They allow for the monitoring of the biological activity of deep-sea organisms on temporal scales that were never attained before. In this paper, we customized Convolutional Neural Network image processing to track behavioral activities in an iconic conservation deep-sea species¿the bubblegum coral Paragorgia arborea¿in response to ambient oceanographic conditions at the Lofoten-Vesterålen observatory. Images and concomitant oceanographic data were taken hourly from February to June 2018. We considered coral activity in terms of bloated, semi-bloated and non-bloated surfaces, as proxy for polyp filtering, retraction and transient activity, respectively. A test accuracy of 90.47% was obtained. Chronobiology-oriented statistics and advanced Artificial Neural Network (ANN) multivariate regression modeling proved that a daily coral filtering rhythm occurs within one major dusk phase, being independent from tides. Polyp activity, in particular extrusion, increased from March to June, and was able to cope with an increase in chlorophyll concentration, indicating the existence of seasonality. Our study shows that it is possible to establish a model for the development of automated pipelines that are able to extract biological information from times series of images. These are helpful to obtain multidisciplinary information from cabled observatory infrastructures ; This project is funded by The Norwegian Research Council, Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy of Germany (03SX464C) and the Helmholtz Gemeinschaft Deutscher Forschungszentren (HGF) project Modular Observation Solutions for Earth Systems (MOSES), Spanish Centre for the Development of Industrial Technology (EXP 00108707/SERA-20181020), and co-funded by European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under the framework of European Research Area Network (ERA-NET) Cofund Maritime and Marine Technologies for a new Era (MarTERA)

10 pages, 5 figures, 1 table ; Deep-sea ecosystems of the Iberian margin have been widely impacted over the past decades, but the limited knowledge on their biodiversity and functioning limits our ability to contribute to their conservation. So far, in the Gulf of Cadiz, research has mostly been focused on megabenthic assemblages associated to mud volcanoes. However, several other geomorphological structures have remained widely unexplored. Here, by means of a quantitative analysis of 17 video transects conducted between 220 and 980 m depth, we investigated megabenthic assemblages associated to canyons, contouritic channels, contouritic furrows and open slopes. We report the presence of 8 different assemblages, segregated as a result of the different substrates and geomorphologic features. Megabenthic assemblages on hard substrates were characterized by mono or multispecific sponge assemblages. Soft bottoms hosted crinoid beds, pennatulacean meadows and fields of the gorgonian Radicipes gracilis. These results highlight the high diversity of megabenthic assemblages in deep-sea ecosystems of the Gulf of Cadiz and suggest that most of the geomorphological features that remained so far unexplored represent vulnerable marine ecosystems deserving protection and inclusion in future management plans ; The present study was developed in the framework of the Tecnoterra (ICM-CSIC/UPC) Associate Unit and the following project activities, funded by the Spanish Government MOWER (CTM 2012-39599-C03), FAUCES (CTM2015-65461-C2-1-R) and RESBIO (TEC2017-87861-R), plus the ARIM (Autonomous Robotic sea-floor Infrastructure for benthopelagic Monitoring) funded by the MartTERA ERA-Net Cofound and by the project PRIN GLIDE (MUR-IT). [.] This work acknowledges the 'Severo Ochoa Centre of Excellence' accreditation (CEX2019-000928-S). Francescangeli M. was funded by the European Project ERASMUS grant 2017 ; Peer reviewed

7 pages, 3 figures, supporting information https://doi.org/10.1002/aqc.3118 ; In the Mediterranean Sea, gorgonians are among the main habitat-forming species of benthic communities on the continental shelf and slope, playing an important ecological role in coral gardens. In areas where bottom trawling is restricted, gorgonians represent one of the main components of trammel net bycatch. Since gorgonians are long-lived and slow-growing species, impacts derived from fishing activities can have far-reaching and long-lasting effects, jeopardizing their long-term viability. Thus, mitigation and ecological restoration initiatives focusing on gorgonian populations on the continental shelf are necessary to enhance and speed up their natural recovery. Bycatch gorgonians from artisanal fishermen were transplanted into artificial structures, which were then deployed at 85 m depth on the outer continental shelf of the marine protected area of Cap de Creus (north-west Mediterranean Sea, Spain). After 1 year, high survival rates of transplanted colonies (87.5%) were recorded with a hybrid remotely operated vehicle. This pilot study shows, for the first time, the survival potential of bycatch gorgonians once returned to their habitat on the continental shelf, and suggests the potential success of future scaled-up restoration activities ; This study was developed within the frame of the ShelfReCover project (Ecological restoration of benthic ecosystem engineers on the Mediterranean continental shelf project) funded by the Fundación BBVA. Funding was also provided by the EU's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement no. 689518 (MERCES). This output reflects only the authors' views, and the European Union cannot be held responsible for any use that may be made of the information contained herein. M. Montseny was founded by an FPU 2014 research grant (FPU2014_06977) from the Spanish government. A. Gori received funding from a Beatriu de Pinos 2013 research grant (BP‐B00074) from the Generalitat de Catalunya and the Marie Curie Fellowship from the EU‐funded project Ithaca, as well as from a Juan de la Cierva 2015 research grant (IJCI‐2015‐23962) from the Spanish government ; Peer Reviewed

21 pages, 5 figures, 1 table, supplementary material https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fmars.2021.621151/full#supplementary-material ; 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 climate change. Since their life-history traits such as long lifespan and slow growth rates make CWCs very vulnerable to potential threats, it is a foremost challenge to explore the viability of restoration actions to enhance and speed up their recovery. In contrast to terrestrial and shallow-water marine ecosystems, ecological restoration in deep marine environments has received minimal attention. This review, by means of a systematic literature search, aims to identify CWC restoration challenges, assess the most suitable techniques to restore them, and discuss future perspectives. Outcomes from the few restoration actions performed to date on CWCs, which have lasted between 1 to 4 years, provide evidence of the feasibility of coral transplantation and artificial reef deployments. Scientific efforts should focus on testing novel and creative restoration techniques, especially to scale up to the spatial and temporal scales of impacts. There is still a general lack of knowledge about the biological, ecological and habitat characteristics of CWC species exploration of which would aid the development of effective restoration measures. To ensure the long-term viability and success of any restoration action it is essential to include holistic and long-term monitoring programs, and to ideally combine active restoration with natural spontaneous regeneration (i.e., passive restoration) strategies such as the implementation of deep-sea marine protected areas (MPAs). We conclude that a combination of passive and active restoration approaches with involvement of local society would be the best optimal option to achieve and ensure CWC restoration success ; MM was funded by a FPU 2014 research grant (FPU2014_06977) from the Spanish government (Spain). AGr received funding from a Juan de la Cierva 2015 research grant (IJCI-2015-23962) from the Spanish government. CL gratefully acknowledges the financial support by ICREA under the ICREA Academia program. This study was supported by the SHELFRECOVER project funded by the Fundación BBVA and the European Union's Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Program under grant agreements nos. 689518 (MERCES) and 678760 (ATLAS) ; With the institutional support of the 'Severo OchoaCentre of Excellence' accreditation (CEX2019-000928-S) ; Peer reviewed