Coupling bio-logging with nutritional geometry to reveal novel insights into the foraging behaviour of a plunge-diving marine predator

It is widely believed that predators maximise their energy intake while foraging and consume prey that are nutritionally similar. We combined GPS data loggers, miniaturised cameras, dietary sampling and nutritional geometry to examine the nutritional variability in the prey and selected diet, and foraging performance, of the masked booby (Sula dactylatra tasmani), a wild carnivore and marine top predator. Data loggers also revealed no significant differences between sexes in the foraging performance of chick-rearing adults. Females provided more food to their chicks than the males and, regardless of the nutritional variability of prey consumed, both sexes showed similar amounts of protein and lipid in their diets. Miniaturised cameras combined with nutritional analysis of prey provided, for the first time, fine-scale detail of the amounts of macronutrients consumed in each plunge dive and the overall foraging trip. Our methodology could be considered for future studies that aim to contribute to the general understanding of the behavioural and physiological mechanisms and ecological and evolutionary significance of animal foraging (e.g. energy expenditure budgets and prey selection for self- and offspring-feeding that could lead to sex-specific foraging strategies).     

The alignment of the Crab pulsar magnetic axis

The magnetic distortion is estimated for neutron stars in which the matter in the interior consists of superfluid neutrons and superconducting protons. For type II proton superconductivity, the arrangement of magnetic flux in a two-dimensional lattice of quantized fluxoids and the kinetic energy of the supercurrent carriers cause some components of the spatially averaged stress tensor for field and superconductor to be several orders of magnitude greater than the components of the Max-well stress tensor for a uniform distribution of the same magnetic flux. It is shown that for the Crab pulsar PSR 0531+21, which is considered to have the greater part of its mass in the form of superfluid neutrons and superconducting protons, the magnetic distortion is almost certainly more important than the clastic energy of the outer shell in determining the departure of the inertia tensor from its spherically symmetric form. With the assumption that internal and external magnetic fields have the same symmetry axis, the external field dipole moment of the Crab pulsar is predicted to be approximately perpendicular to the spin direction, in agreement with a number of published interpretations of observational data.     

Viking 1 Lander on the surface of mars: Revised location

Late in 1977, the periapsis altitude of the Viking Orbiters was lowered from 1500 to 300 km. The higher resolution of pictures taken at the lower altitude (8 m/pixel) permitted a more accurate determination of the location of the Viking 1 Lander by correlating topographic features seen in the new pictures with the same features in lander pictures. The position of the lander on Viking Orbiter picture 452B11 (NGF Rectilinear) is line 293, sample 1099. This location of the Viking 1 Lander has been used in a revision of the control net of Mars (M.E. Davies, F.Y. Katayama, and J.A. Roth, R2309 NASA, The Rand Corp., Feb. 1978). The new areographic coordinates of the lander are lat 22.483° N and long 47.968° W. The new location is estimated to be accurate to within 50 m.     

The soft X-ray polychromator for the Solar Maximum Mission

The 1.4–22.4 Å range of the soft X-ray spectrum includes a multitude of emission lines which are important for the diagnosis of plasmas in the 1.5–50 million degree temperature range. In particular, the hydrogen and helium-like ions of all abundant solar elements with Z > 7 have their primary transitions in this region and these are especially useful for solar flare and active region studies. The soft X-ray polychromator (XRP) is a high resolution experiment working in this spectral region. The XRP consists of two instruments with a common control, data handling and power system. The bent crystal spectrometer is designed for high time resolution studies in lines of Fe i-Fe xxvi and Ca xix. The flat crystal scanning spectrometer provides for 7 channel polychromatic mapping of flares and active regions in the resonance lines of O viii, Ne ix, Mg xi, Si xiii, S xv, Ca xix, and Fe xxv with 14 spatial resolution. In its spectral scanning mode it covers essentially the entire 1.4–22.5 Å region.This paper summarizes the scientific objectives of the XRP experiment and describes the characteristics and capabilities of the two instruments. Sufficient technical information for experiment feasibility studies is included and the resources and procedures planned for the use of the XRP within the context of the Solar Maximum Mission is briefly discussed.     

Collective action problems posed by no-take zones

Around 0.04% of the world's marine area is presently designated as no-take zone (NTZ), in which all fishing is banned. The IUCN, backed by many marine fisheries and ecology scientists, has called for this to be increased to 20–30% by 2012 in order to conserve fish stocks and marine biodiversity. This ambitious target presents a number of collective action problems (CAPs) that must be addressed and overcome if fishers and other relevant actors are to collaborate towards its achievement. These are discussed, drawing on the common-pool resource (CPR) literature, with particular reference to those raised by divergent aims, predictability, different knowledges, role of advocacy, locality, level of decision-making and enforceability. As NTZs are ultimately about altering the behaviour of humans, it is argued that studies based on social sciences, on how NTZs can be designed, implemented and enforced on a collective basis, are essential.