How an invasive sea snail triggered cooperation in the Black Sea

From 200 m all the way down to its deepest point of 2 200 m, the Black Sea is nearly as lifeless as a foreign planet. At its surface, however, it hosts a rich and productive ecosystem providing the lifeblood of coastal communities for millennia. It is in this fertile environment that the invasive species, Rapana venosa (commonly known as rapa whelk), settled and rapidly reproduced, threatening local ecosystems through its prodigious appetite for other molluscs.