On the chemical composition of atmospheric aerosols — Part II: Trends between some chemical components of rainwater and physical variables over the United States

Summary Annual average results of rainwater analysis, carried out byC. Junge at about 60 stations of the United States sampling network are used in an attempt to correlate the ionic species present in rain, as a general contribution to atmospheric chemicstry. Correlation with physical parameters is attempted at the same time in some cases, and the resulting trends discussed. The results obtained are presented in the general form of linear and planar correlation, and linear regression coefficients.     

On the chemical composition of atmospheric aerosols — Part I: Some stoichiometric aspects of the problem

Summary Following a recent hypothesis on the role of activated sodium chloride particles as possible condensation and sublimation nuclei, an analysis of data given byC. Junge on the chemical composition of aerosols, is made. It is established that all reported giant nuclei fall into three distinct categories of composition and that within each of these categories the ratio of the sums of anions to the sums of cations for constituents for which analyses were made, remains remarkably constant throughout the days of sampling, and for both geographic positions at which sampling has been carried out. A dependence of the hydroxide-carbonate content, on that of nitrate is also indicated in the «alkaline» nuclei. The system is treated as a saturated solution, and it is shown by the procedure of continuous variations that singularities occur at particular ratios of the prevalent chemical groups in solution, possibly indicating formation of complex species. This, together with the presence of double salts in the solid phase may be partly the reason for the constancy of ratio of sums in the groups of particles studied byJunge, while the grouping itself may depend on the origin and subsequent transformations of the particles.Parts of this paper were presented at the 174-th National Meeting of the American Meteorological Society, on the 29-th of January, 1959, in New York.     

Imprudent fishing harvests and consequent trophic cascades on the West Florida shelf over the last half century: A harbinger of increased human deaths from paralytic shellfish poisoning along the southeastern United States, in response to oligotrophication?

Within the context of ubiquitous overfishing of piscivores, recent consequent increments of jellyfish and clupeids have occurred at the zooplanktivore trophic level in the eastern Gulf of Mexico (GOM), after overfishing of one of their predators, i.e. red snapper. Initiation of a local trophic cascade thence led to declines of herbivore stocks, documented here on the West Florida shelf. These exacerbating world-wide trophic cascades have resulted in larger harmful algal blooms (HABs), already present at the base of most coastal food webs. Impacts on human health have thus far been minimal within nutrient-rich coastal regions. To provide a setting for past morbidities, consideration is given to chronologies of other trophic cascades within eutrophic, cold water marine ecosystems of the Scotian Sea, in the Gulf of Alaska, off Southwest Africa, within the Barents, White, and Black Seas, in the Gulf of Maine, and finally in the North Sea. Next, comparison is now made here of recent ten-fold increments within Florida waters of both relatively benign and saxitoxic HABs, some of which are fatal to humans. These events are placed in a perspective of other warm shelf systems of the South China and Caribbean Seas to assess prior and possible future poison toxicities of oligotrophic coastal habitats. Past wide-spread kills of fishes and sea urchins over the Caribbean Sea and the downstream GOM are examined in relation to the potential transmission of dinoflagellate saxitoxin and other epizootic poison vectors by western boundary currents over larger “commons” than local embayments. Furthermore, since some HABs produce more potent saxitoxins upon nutrient depletion, recent decisions to ban seasonal fertilizer applications to Florida lawns may have unintended consequences. In the future, human-killing phytoplankton, rather than relatively benign fish-killing HABs of the past, may be dispersed along the southeastern United States seaboard.     

Planetary waves observed by TIMED/SABER in coupling the stratosphere–mesosphere–lower thermosphere during the winter of 2003/2004: Part 1—Comparison with the UKMO temperature results

Part 1 of the present paper is focused on the types of planetary wave seen in the TIMED/SABER and UK Met Office (UKMO) temperature data in the Northern Hemisphere (NH) (0–50°N) stratosphere (30–60 km) during the Arctic winter of 2003/2004, as the emphasis is on their spatial structure (latitude and altitude) and temporal evolution particularly in relation to the stratospheric warmings. A new method for analysis of satellite data is presented in this study where the migrating and nonmigrating tides and planetary waves (stationary, zonally symmetric and travelling) are simultaneously extracted from the satellite data. The comparison between the altitude and latitude structure of the SABER and UKMO planetary waves in the temperature field of the NH stratosphere indicates a high degree of qualitative and quantitative resemblance and in this way the validity of the new data analysis method is verified as well.