The public defence of the PhD dissertation entitled "The identification of groups of organisms dominant in phytoplankton blooms in the Baltic Sea using non-contact methods" by our colleague Monika Woźniak took place on 22 May 2015. The research work for this dissertation was carried out at the Institutes of Oceanography and Geography of the University of Gdańsk. The supervisor was Professor Adam Krężel (IO UG) and the assistant supervisor was Dr Mirosław Darecki (IO PAN). The dissertation was reviewed by Dr Dariusz Ficek (Institute of Physics, Pomeranian Academy, Słupsk) and Dr Mirosława Ostrowska (IO PAN).