In the mid-1970s, Nevo started a long-term project on pollution biology in an attempt to develop a biological monitor to record the quality of marine environments. The program included controlled field and laboratory experiments involving thermal and chemical (inorganic and organic pollutants) stresses in a wide range of marine organisms, e.g., crustaceans and mollusks. It was demonstrated that allozymes diversity is sensitive to environmental pollution stresses. Nevo proposed using allozyme and DNA variation, at both the single and multilocus levels, as genetic monitoring systems to alert conservationists about
environmental deterioration before pollution causes species extinction
