Acknowledgements
We wish to thank all the participants of the GBYP biological sampling
program, in particular Naiara Serrano, Xiker Salaberria and Inma Martín
for tissue sample handling and storage, Iraide Artetxe-Arrate and Ai
Kimoto for database management and Iñaki Mendibil and Elisabete Bilbao
for excellent laboratory work. We also would like to thank Marty Kardos
for his valuable comments, contributing to the quality improvement of
this manuscript. This study has been carried out under the provision of
the ICCAT Atlantic Wide Research Program for Bluefin Tuna (GBYP), funded
by the European Community (Grant SI2/542789), Canada, Croatia, Japan,
Norway, Turkey, United States (NMFS NA11NMF4720107), Chinese Taipei, and
the ICCAT Secretariat. This work was also supported by a grant (project
GENGES) and a predoctoral fellowship to ND-A, from the Department of
Agriculture and Fisheries of the Basque Government. The contents of the
paper do not necessarily reflect the point of view of ICCAT or of the
other funders. This manuscript is contribution number X [to be added
upon acceptance] from the Marine Research Division of AZTI.