Dear colleagues, We are pleased to announce the publication of the following article: Díaz López, B & Shirai, J.A.B, 2009. Mediterranean common bottlenose dolphin's repertoire and communication use, In: Dolphins: Anatomy, Behavior and Threats, (Agustin G. Pearce and Lucía M. Correa. Eds.) Nova Science Publishers, Inc. pp 129-148. For a book copy please visithttps://www.novapublishers.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=11155 or send pdf requests of this article to: bruno@thebdri.com, soon a copy will be available in our website www.thebdri.com ABSTRACTBottlenose dolphins are an extremely vocal mammalian species and vocal communicationplays an important role in mediating social interactions. This study carried out year roundfrom 2005 to 2008 represents the first attempt in the Mediterranean basin to outline therepertoire, production rates of social sounds, and associated behavior of Mediterraneanbottlenose dolphins. Data were collected as part of a long term study, in which acousticrecording and behavioral observations (from surface and underwater) were made. Over the 4-year study period, 25 months were spent in the field and the dataset consisted of 35 hours of dolphin observations and simultaneous recordings. The acoustic repertoire observed in this study was extremely diverse. Bottlenose dolphin communication sounds ranged from soft and melodic sounds to harder, almost harsh sounds. The results, showing that vocal emission increased, especially in those activities involving excited depredation or socializing, confirmed that activity and social signals production were related. Moreover, the fact that was observed a positive relation between group size and the production of social signals, confirms that dolphin vocalizations are used for communicative and social purposes. My findings on social signals emission also suggest that burst pulses vocalizations probably play an equally important social signaling role as do tonal sounds. Particularly, “long burst pulsed sounds”, in agonistic interactions like those observed during depredation, could be used with the intent to settle rank conflicts and avoid competition between group members. This study also gathered evidence to support the use of whistles as contact calls between mother and calf pairs of dolphins. Although many of these vocalizations have been described in the literature, their association with specific behaviors provides additional contextual information about their potential use as communication signals. Bruno Diaz Lopez Chief Researcher / Marine Zoologist Bottlenose Dolphin Research Institute BDRI V.Armando Diaz Nº4 07020 Golfo Aranci (SS) Italy www.thebdri.com info@thebdri.com tel.+ 39 346 081 5414 tel. + 0789 183 1197