Identification and Ecology of Freshwater Arthropods in the Mediterranean Basin

Identification and Ecology of Freshwater Arthropods in the Mediterranean Basin covers the entire Mediterranean basin, including parts of Europe, Asia, Africa and the Mediterranean islands, but excluding other biogeographic locations with Mediterranean climates located outside the region. The book provides an extensive description of the taxonomy and ecology of aquatic arthropods encountered in lentic and lotic habitats, as well as in less studied underground and estuarine habitats. It offers expanded taxonomic identification keys to major groups of arthropods with a description of their ecology and distribution. Keys for insects include aquatic larval stages and water-dwelling adults of Coleoptera and Heteroptera. Additional sections focus on taxa that can be encountered in adjacent brackish and estuary ecosystems as long as the taxon primarily occurs in freshwaters. This is a much-needed, comprehensive resource on the taxonomy and ecology of freshwater arthropods with an introduction to recent molecular tools for identifications. It will be particularly useful for freshwater ecologists, limnologists, environmentalists and students in the ecological sciences.

Dr. Alain Maasri is a freshwater ecologist at the Leibniz-Institute of Freshwater Ecology and Inland Fisheries (Berlin, Germany), and a Research Associate at The Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel University (Philadelphia, USA). He obtained his Masters and Ph.D. degrees from Université Aix-Marseille in France where he examined the ecology and functioning of Mediterranean streams. His research interests include community ecology and functional ecology of stream macroinvertebrates, and more specifically chironomid midges (Diptera). Dr. Maasri has been researching freshwater ecosystems and benthic communities for over 10 years, across the Mediterranean basin, Mongolia and the USA. Dr James Thorp was senior editor (with Alan Covich) for the prior editions of Ecology and Classification of North American Freshwater Invertebrates, which has developed into a multi-volume, global work for this edition. He also published in 2008 The Riverine Ecosystem Synthesis (Thorp, Thoms, and Delong) and Field Guide to Freshwater Invertebrates of North America in 2011 (Thorp and Rogers). He has contributed and authored approximately 100 chapters, books, and publications in journals (e.g., BioScience, Ecology, Freshwater Biology, Freshwater Science, Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment, Oecologia, Oikos, River Research and Applications, and River Systems). He is on the Editorial Boards for River Research and Applications and River Systems; former Assoc. Editor of Freshwater Invertebrate Biology (now Freshwater Science) and has reviewed multiple journal articles and books along with grant proposals for NSF, DOE, EPA, etc.; NSF and EPA panel member. He has been assisting the EPA as an Expert intermittently since 2008, is a former Assoc Director for the Center for Environmental Management at Clarkson and a Past President for the International Society for River Science. This book will be the fifth edition of Thorp and Covich’s Freshwater Invertebrates.