Rome, 7 July (LaPresse) – The Mediterranean is now tropical, so much so that it is warming up more than any other sea. This is according to WWF Italy, which, on International Mediterranean Day, republished an article by Roberto Danovaro, professor of marine biology at the Polytechnic University of Marche and president of the Scientific Community of WWF Italy, published in the latest issue of the association's magazine “Panda”. “Climate change is increasingly evident and strikes with heat waves in the summer,” the article notes, “when the waters of the Mediterranean reach temperatures higher than those of the tropics, the effects on marine biodiversity and the functioning of ecosystems become devastating”. The Mediterranean covers less than 1% of the global ocean surface and contains 0.3% of the world's water. It is, therefore, “a sort of huge pool, with an average depth of about 1.5 kilometres (compared to almost 4 km for the large oceans). Because it is shallow, its waters warm up at higher rates than any other sea”. ‘In this miniature ocean,’ explains Danovaro, ‘we can observe changes as if we were in a giant natural laboratory. In this way, we can also understand and predict the response of the great oceans to global changes.’
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