“…There are many factors behind this assertion: (1) it is a transitional region between mid-latitudes and subtropical climate regimes; (2) it is dominated by the Mediterranean Sea, a semi-enclosed sea which is an important source of moisture and a heat reservoir, that has also been considered as a miniature ocean by physical, chemical, climatic and environmental studies (Bethoux et al, 1999); and (3) the Mediterranean environment has experienced a strong human impact since ancient times due to demographic pressure, agricultural exploitation, urbanization and, more recently, coastal tourism. Many works (Bethoux et al, 1990(Bethoux et al, , 1998Rholin and Bryden, 1992;Vargas-Yáñez et al, 2005 confirm the increase in temperature in deep, intermediate and surface Mediterranean waters, and others explore the effects of this warming in the biology and ecology of organisms in the sea (see the review by Lejeusne et al, 2010) as well as its role in fisheries fluctuations (Tzanatos et al, 2014). It is important to further increase our knowledge of regional, seasonal and decadal variability on temperatures in the Mediterranean environment as temperature changes interact with pollution, overfishing, sea level changes or acidification, and can trigger major changes in the ecosystems.…”