Vibrio Sea Project was initiated 18 months ago. During this period very important results were achieved thanks to the implication of partners into the collaborative work.

The major part of the first project phase was performing sampling campaigns. They were done on regular basis and closely followed the initial requirements. As the result, the network of sampling sites is now fully operational. Scientists measured a range of environmental parameters as well as vibrio concentration in different types of samples.

An other main objective was harmonizing protocols. The standardization was done for sampling methods, tools and techniques. This information is available from meta-data template (see attached file, in the rubric in situ data ). The harmonization work was also done for microbiological methods. All that was necessary to process and compare data in most efficient way.

About 1000 samples were processed in order to find a correlation between environmental parameters and vibrio concentration in different type of samples, both of them measured in situ. A statistically significant correlation was pre-established between some of them. This work is currently being extended by project team.

Space data were continuously supplied to the microbiologists during the whole period. An important task was to look for the correlation between environmental parameters measured in situ and by satellite. A clear correlation was established for the Sea Surface Temperature. As to two others parameters, Chlorophyll and Turbidity an additional work have to be done before using space data in an operational way.

Moreover, the project results were presented during international conference “Vibrio 2007”. Two kinds of communication were done: a oral presentation “A satellite-based early warning system to monitor and prevent vibrios-related diseases in the Mediterranean basin” (available here after , in attached documents ) and a poster “Incidence of pathogenic Vibrio species in marine samples from the Mediterranean area and its correlation with environmental factors” (available here after , in attached documents)

During the next phase the attention will be concentrated on two issues: the statistical processing of data collected during campaigns, on one hand and a more precise microbiological analysis, on the other hand. Samplings will be carried by some partners till mid 2008 in order to dispose of complete data set.

Oral presentation :

Poster