Otolith guides
The maintenance of otoliths in well-organized collections contributes to their use in studies of different natures (Campana, 2005). By using those collections, many researchers have organized otolith guides in institutions devoted to the research and teaching across multiple fields (e.g. Williams; McEldowney, 1990; Volpedo; Echeverría, 2000; Assis, 2004; Campana, 2004; Baremore; Bethea, 2005; Lombarte et al., 2006; Furlani et al., 2007; Tuset et al., 2008).
Several studies have included evolutionary written histories based on the knowledge of the fish otoliths, the most complete of them including those of Hecht (1987), Assis (2004) and Tuset et al. (2008).
Currently, there are several catalogues related to the otoliths: Schmidt (1968) covering the fish of the eastern Atlantic; Morrow (1977; 1979) on fishes from the American North Atlantic coast; Nolf (1985) describing species with wide distribution and fossils; Härkönen (1986) covering fishes from the North Sea; Hecht (1987), Smale et al. (1995) on species from South Africa; Williams and McEldowney (1990) on species from the Australian Antarctic region; Rivaton and Bourret (1999) concerning the Indo-Pacific species; Naveda (2001) dealing with species from Peru; Volpedo and Echeverría (2000) concerning species from Argentina; Assis (2000; 2004) covering species from the coastal regions, estuaries and rivers of Portugal; Campana (2004) devoted to the North American species; Furlani et al. (2007) on species from Australia and Sadighzadeh et al. (2012) on species from the Persian Gulf and the Oman Sea.
The above-mentioned studies are specifically focused on the otoliths; however, there are many other authors who acknowledge the importance of the morphology of those structures and include images and/or detailed descriptions of otoliths in their studies, even when their studies have other purposes. Among those studies involving this matter are: Rodríguez-Roda (1980); Gauldie (1988); Messieh et al. (1989); Lombarte and Castellón (1991); Lombarte (1992); Popper and Platt (1993); Campana and Casselman (1993); Lombarte and Morales-Nin (1995); Nielsen (1995); Aguirre and Lombarte (1999); Lychakov and Rebane (2000); Volpedo and Echeverría (2000; 2003); Ramcharitar et al. (2001; 2004); Morales-Nin and Panfili (2002); Aguirre (2003); Assis (2003; 2004; 2005); Tuset et al. (2003a; 2003b; 2006; 2008); Cardinale et al. (2004); Cruz and Lombarte (2004); Lychakov et al. (2006) and Lombarte and Cruz (2007) (more studies are quoted in Lombarte et al., 2006).
In Brazil, studies aimed exclusively to characterize the otoliths of the Teleost species of the Southeastern-Southern shelves have been conducted by: Braga and Goiten (1985) who described the otoliths of the bluewing searobin, Prionotus punctatus, of the Anchieta Island region in the São Paulo state; Bastos (1990) analyzed the teleost fish of that region; Corrêa and Vianna (1992/93), Lemos et al. (1992/93) and Abilhôa and Corrêa (1992/93) described the otoliths of the sciaenids, gerreids and carangids of the Paraná coast, respectively; Monteiro et al. (2005) analyzed the sciaenids otoliths from Rio de Janeiro.
The IOUSP’s Laboratório de Ictiofauna e Crescimento – LABIC has produced several publications, including Vaz-dos-Santos et al. (2007), Bellucco (2008), Siliprandi (2009), Santificetur et al. (2010; 2013) and Rossi-Wongtschowski et al. (2014).