The volume is best described as a “Festschrift” on the occasion of the 40th anniversary of the Romanian marine station. It includes congratulatory messages from a large number of sister institutions in various languages, but all accompanied by a translation in English. Some of these messages have a scientific or historical value(s), as they describe multinational programs carried out even during the Ceaucescu dictatorship, and include sometimes detailed reference lists (p. 193). These pages constitute a valuable contribution to the history of the marine sciences.

The volume includes a brief but comprehensive biography and a selected bibliography of Grigore Antipa, whom many consider as the “father” of Romanian oceanography (pp. 183–188).

The first 182 pages introduce, in English and in Romanian, the various aspects of Romanian endeavours in oceanography and provide a brief look into the activities of the different institutions, laboratories, and marine stations of Romania through the 100 years that the discipline developed on the shores of the Black Sea. Numerous graphs, diagrams, maps, histogrammes, and tables are illustrative of these efforts.

Chapters on marine ecology, Doppler effect and physical oceanography, environmental considerations, and ongoing and planned projects are discussed in detail, and space is devoted to the challenges and opportunities existing in the management of living marine resources.

A detailed table of contents and an index would have made this attractive book an easier-to-consult reference tool.