The main scientific objectives of AquaDEB are:

  i) to study and compare the sensitivity of aquatic species (molluscs and fish) to environmental variability of natural or human origin,

 ii) to evaluate the related consequences at different biological levels (individual, population, ecosystem) and temporal scales (life cycle, population dynamics, evolution).


The ERG will work on two groups of aquatic animals: molluscs and fish. The principal marine species to be studied and compared are:
The Japanese oyster Crassostrea gigas,
The blue mussel Mytilus edulis,
The Manila clam Tapes philippinarum,
The great scallop Pecten maximus,
The ormer Haliotis tuberculata,
The cockle Cerastoderma edule,
The slipper limpet Crepidula fornicata,
The sole Solea solea,
The hake Merluccius merlucius,
The anchovy Engraulis encrasicolus,
The herring Clupea harengus,
And species of tropical tuna Thunnus obesus, Thunnus albacares.
A freshwater mollusc, the stagnant pond snail (Lymnaea stagnalis), completes this list.
All these species belong to widely separated phyla and exhibit contrasting reactions to environmental constraints on behaviour and physiology (i.e. sessile or mobile, opportunist or sensitive). Such diversity makes this group of species useful for testing the robustness of the DEB theory.


The various strategies of energy allocation will be described and quantified in these two groups of aquatic animals by means of a single mechanistic model, the DEB model. This model gives a common conceptual framework, which allows energy fluxes to growth, development, maintenance and reproduction of different aquatic animals to be analysed and compared.