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The aragonitic skeletons of bathyal cold-water corals have a high potential as geochemical in situ archives for paleoceanography. Oxygen isotopes and stable carbon isotopes (δ¹⁸O and δ¹³C) have been analyzed, as well as trace and minor element compositions (e.g. Mg/Ca, Sr/Ca, U/Ca, B/Ca and P/Ca) in Lophelia pertusa, one of the most important frame-builders at the Santa Maria di Leuca (SML) deep-water coral hotspot in the Central Mediterranean. The Apulian Bank is swept by strong currents of the Adriatic Deep Water Outflow. The temperature of 13.9°C is the highest temperature recorded for L. pertusa and provides an important end-member of environmental conditions for geochemical analyses on living Atlantic and Mediterranean cold-water corals. Temperature and salinity (38.77PSU) are stable throughout the year, and thus virtually no changes should be observed in the stable oxygen isotope signal …