Spider crabs of the genus Eurynome have complex taxonomic, phylogenetic, and biogeographic histories worldwide. Using newly generated molecular data, including the characterization of complete mitochondrial genomes, we addressed several unresolved questions surrounding the genus and its two Atlantic‐Mediterranean representatives, the type species Eurynome aspera and its sympatric Eurynome spinosa . DNA‐barcoding and reverse ta...

This collective article presents new information about 18 species occurring in 12 Mediterranean countries from the Alboran Sea to the Levantine Sea. Five lessepsian species namely Erugosquilla massavensis, Syrnola fasciata, Plocamopherus ocellatus, Maritigrella fuscopunctata and Siganus javus have spread within 2025 to neighbouring MSFD areas. Another five are here reported as first country records [Polyandrocarpa zorritensis...

New records of rarely reported species in the Mediterranean Sea (December 2025)

This collective study presents information on fifteen (15) species recorded across five countries (Greece, Italy, Slovenia, Spain, and Türkiye) and four (4) ecoregions, ranging from the Alboran Sea to the Aegean Sea. The recorded species belong to three phyla: Mollusca (3 species), Arthropoda (3 species), and Chordata (9 species). Among mollusks, Martadoris mediterranea is reported for the first time in the Aegean Sea at two d...

This Collective Article compiles information on nineteen (19) species recorded in seven (7) Mediterranean countries (Croatia, Cyprus, Italy, Malta, Slovenia, Syria, and Türkiye) and across four major sub-basins (Adriatic, Western, Central, and Eastern Mediterranean). The documented taxa represent eight (8) phyla: Annelida (four species), Arthropoda (three), Bryozoa (one), Chordata (two), Cnidaria (two), Mollusca (five), Chloro...

Appropriate diagnoses of parasites of apex marine predators are crucial to understand their biodiversity, host specificity, biogeography, and life cycles. Such diagnoses are also informative of ecological and biological characteristics of both host and environment in which the hosts and their parasites live. We here (i) investigate the parasite fauna of a bluntnose sixgill shark Hexanchus griseus (Bonnaterre, 1788) obtained fr...

This Collective Article presents information about 30 species with records in eight countries (Greece, Israel, Italy, Montenegro, Slovenia, Spain, Syria and Türkiye) and six ecoregions extending from the Alboran to the Levantine Seas. The recorded species belong to eight Phyla (4 Chlorophyta, 1 Rhodophyta, 1 Porifera, 3 Cnidaria, 2 Platyhelminthes, 2 Arthropoda, 2 Mollusca and 15 Chordata) as follows: Chlorophyta: Didymosporan...

This collective article presents new information about 15 introduced taxa belonging to five phyla: one Rhodophyta, one Chlorophyta, one Mollusca, one Annelida, two Arthropoda, and nine Chordata (one Ascidiacea and eight Osteichthyes). The records refer to eight Mediterranean countries and extend from the Alboran Sea to the Levantine Sea as follows: Spain: first record of the African hind Cephalopholis taeniops for the Alboran...

This Collective Article presents new information about the occurrence of 23 marine taxa that belong to five Phyla: two Chlorophyta, one Annelida, six Mollusca, three Arthropoda, eleven Chordata (one Ascidiacea, one Elasmobranchii and nine Teleostei) and extending from the Western Mediterranean to the Levantine Sea. All these records were reported from nine countries from the western to the eastern Mediterranean Sea, with a bro...

This Collective article reports 17 introduced species and 22 new locations for these species in the Mediterranean Sea. The reports are from three different Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD) subregions (Aegean-Levantine Sea, Adriatic Sea and Western Mediterranean Sea) and the Sea of Marmara and cover ten different countries. The goal of consistent and detailed reporting of introduced species is to complement the existi...

The metazoan parasite community and the stomach contents of the nursehound shark Scyliorhinus stellaris from the Gulf of Naples (central Mediterranean Sea) were studied. The nursehound shark harboured a poor parasite community composed of a species of gill monogenean ( Hexabothrium appendiculatum ) and three intestinal cestode taxa ( Acanthobothrium coronatum and two unidentified species of the genera Yamaguticestus and Scypho...

This Collective Article presents information on 20 taxa belonging to five (5) Phyla: Cnidaria (2), Mollusca (8), Arthropoda (4), Echinodermata (1) and Chordata (5) recorded from the Alboran Sea to the Levantine Sea. These new records were found in seven (7) different ecoregions as follows: Alboran Sea: new record of the rare football octopus Ocythoe tuberculata in the harbour of Algeciras (Spain); Western Mediterranean Sea: fi...

In this Collective Article on alien and cryptogenic diversity in the Mediterranean Sea we report a total of 19 species belonging to nine Phyla and coming from nine countries. Several of these records concern fish species, and of particular interest are the first records of: Terapon puta for Italian waters; Pteragopus trispilus from Malta; Plotosus lineatus from Cyprus; and the northernmost Mediterranean record of Lagocephalus...