About Department of Living Marine Resources

Commercial fishes such as sardines seem to be steadily supplied to the market. In reality, their populations may be superabundant in some years and extremely scarce in other years. Marine populations fluctuate in response to the ocean ecosystem variations. The research activities of the Department of Living Marine Resources focus on the mechanisms linking physical environment variability and population fluctuations (Fisheries Environmental Oceanography), reproductive and early life ecology of fishes and shellfishes as biological bases of the fluctuations (Biology of Fisheries Resources), stock assessment and fisheries management for sustainable use of living marine resources (Fish Population Dynamics), response mechanisms of aquatic organisms to global environmental change (Biological Oceanography).