Occurrence of organochlorine pollutants in the eggs and dropping-amended soil of Antarctic large animals and its ecological significance

Persistent organochlorine pollutants (POPs) are analyzed for the dropping-amended soils from the habitats of Antarctic seabirds and seals in Fildes Peninsula and Ardley Island. The concentration ranges are 0.21 to 3.85 ng/g for polychlorinated biphenyls (ΣPCBs),0.09 to 2.01 ng/g for organochlorine pesticides (ΣDDT),and 0.06 to 0.76 ng/g for hexachlorocyclohexanes (HCHs). Among these,hepata-chlorobiphenyls,hexachlorobiphenyls,p,p′-DDE and α-HCH compounds are dominant. The concentra-tion ranges of ΣPCB,DDT and HCH in the eggs of skuas were 91.9―515.5 ng/g,56.6―304.4 ng/g and 0.5―2.0 ng/g respectively; those in the eggs of penguins were 0.4―0.9 ng/g,2.4―10.3 ng/g and 0.1― 0.4 ng/g; and those in the eggs of giant petrel were 38.1―81.7 ng/g,12.7―53.7 ng/g and 0.5―1.5 ng/g respectively. The dominant POP compounds in the eggs are PCB180,PCB153,p,p′-DDE and hexa-chlorobenzene (HCB). The present study shows that the concentration of POPs in the sea-bird-inhabited-dropping-amended soil varies with the extent of predation and nest occupancy of dif-ferent seabird populations. Statistical analysis on the POP concentrations from the different seabird eggs implies that the difference in the bio-concentration levels of the birds depends on the bio-habits of the species,such as the range of activity,distance of immigration,feeding pattern,and nest occupation. Among these,the most important factor is the location of the seabirds in the food chain and their feeding pattern. This shows that POPs accumulated in the seabirds resulted from the bio-concentration through the food chain. In addtion,210Pb dating for the dropping-amended soils (AD1-a and AD2) was performed,which provided the POP accumulation rate and the historic record for the soil profile. It indicates that POP will continuously affect the Antarctic ecosystem for a long time.     

Seabed characterization from broad-band acoustic echosounding with scattering models

Acoustic echoes obtained during high-resolution shallow marine seismic surveys contain information about the statistical nature of the sedimentary bottom and its spatial variability. Use of a broad-band seismic source and an appropriately chosen data acquisition window makes the acoustic responses particularly amenable to quantitive analysis. The work reported utilizes experimental frequency-domain spatial coherence functions of along-track acoustic echoes as empirical metrics of bottom character, and by virtue of their correlation with known sediment types, as objective bases for remote sediment classification. Theoretical relationships between parameters describing sediment surface topographies and echo coherence are derived for the case of dominant water-sediment interface acoustic scattering. The diverse experimental data base was acquired from the Grand Banks of Newfoundland using a 1- to 10-kHz Huntec DTS system. Bottom photographs, cores, and grab samples combined with expert geological synthesis provide qualitative and quantitative control.     

Marine organic geochemistry of the Eastern Mediterranean: 1. Aliphatic and polyaromatic hydrocarbons in Cretan Sea surficial sediments

As part of a lipid biogeochemical study, aliphatic and polyaromatic hydrocarbons were determined in surficial sediments from the Cretan Sea (South Aegean Sea) in the Eastern Mediterranean. Total concentrations of both aliphatic (AHC) and polyaromatic (PAH) hydrocarbons were low (562–5697 and 14.6–158.5 ng/g, respectively) with respect to other coastal sediments worldwide and compare with concentrations found in open sea areas. The composition of AHC was dominated by unresolved complex mixture (UCM) indicating the presence of petroleum-related hydrocarbon inputs as confirmed by the detection of specific α,β-hopanes. PAH consisted mainly of pyrolytic four- to five-ring compounds. UCM and PAH amounts revealed that Cretan Sea receives low supply of anthropogenic material compared to NW Mediterranean. The spatial distributions of AHC and PAH indicated that urban run-off and transport from the continental self are the major input pathway of anthropogenic and biogenic hydrocarbons from terrestrial sources in the near shore area, whereas atmospheric transport might be the significant source of hydrocarbons in the deep area.     

Fluvial transport of suspended sediment and organic carbon during flood events in a large agricultural catchment in southwest France

Water draining from a large agricultural catchment of 1 110 km² in southwest France was sampled over an 18‐month period to determine the temporal variability in suspended sediment (SS) and dissolved (DOC) and particulate organic carbon (POC) transport during flood events, with quantification of fluxes and controlling factors, and to analyze the relationships between discharge and SS, DOC and POC. A total of 15 flood events were analyzed, providing extensive data on SS, POC and DOC during floods. There was high variability in SS, POC and DOC transport during different seasonal floods, with SS varying by event from 513 to 41 750 t; POC from 12 to 748 t and DOC from 9 to 218 t. Overall, 76 and 62% of total fluxes of POC and DOC occurred within 22% of the study period. POC and DOC export from the Save catchment amounted to 3090 t and 1240 t, equivalent to 1·8 t km^?2 y^?1 and 0·7 t km^?2 y^?1, respectively. Statistical analyses showed that total precipitation, flood discharge and total water yield were the major factors controlling SS, POC and DOC transport from the catchment. The relationships between SS, POC and DOC and discharge over temporal flood events resulted in different hysteresis patterns, which were used to deduce dissolved and particulate origins. In both clockwise and anticlockwise hysteresis, POC mainly followed the same patterns as discharge and SS. The DOC‐discharge relationship was mainly characterized by alternating clockwise and anticlockwise hysteresis due to dilution effects of water originating from different sources in the whole catchment. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Revisiting the Gow Lake impact structure,Saskatchewan, Canada

The ~5 km diameter Gow Lake impact structure formed in the Canadian Shield of northern Saskatchewan approximately 197 Myr ago. This structure has not been studied in detail since its discovery during a regional gravity survey in the early 1970s. We report here on field observations from a 2011 expedition that, when combined with subsequent laboratory studies, have revealed a wealth of new information about this poorly studied Canadian impact structure. Initially considered to be a prototypical central peak (i.e., a complex) impact structure, our observations demonstrate that Gow Lake is actually a transitional impact structure, making it one of only two identified on Earth. Despite its age, a well-preserved sequence of crater-fill impactites is preserved on Calder Island in the middle of Gow Lake. From the base upward, this stratigraphy is parautochthonous target rock, lithic impact breccia, clast-rich impact melt rock, red clast-poor impact melt rock, and green clast-poor impact melt rocks. Discontinuous lenses of impact melt-bearing breccia also occur near the top of the red impact melt rocks and in the uppermost green impact melt rocks. The vitric particles in these breccias display irregular and contorted outlines. This, together with their setting within crater-fill melt rocks, is indicative of an origin as flows within the transient cavity and not an airborne mode of origin. Following impact, a hydrothermal system was initiated, which resulted in alteration of the crater-fill impactites. Major alteration phases are nontronite clay, K-feldspar, and quartz.     

Effects of climate change and urban development on the distribution and conservation of vegetation in a Mediterranean type ecosystem

Climate and land-use changes are projected to threaten biodiversity over this century. However, few studies have considered the spatial and temporal overlap of these threats to evaluate how ongoing land-use change could affect species ranges projected to shift outside conservation areas. We evaluated climate change and urban development effects on vegetation distribution in the Southwest ecoregion, California Floristic Province, USA. We also evaluated how well a conservation network protects suitable habitat for rare plant species under these change projections and identified primary sources of uncertainty. We used consensus-based maps from three species distribution models (SDMs) to project current and future suitable habitat for 19 species representing different functional types (defined by fire-response – obligate seeders, resprouting shrubs – and life forms – herbs, subshrubs), and range sizes (large/common, small/rare). We used one spatially explicit urban growth projection; two climate models, emission scenarios, and probability thresholds applied to SDMs; and high-resolution (90 m) environmental data. We projected that suitable habitat could disappear for 4 species and decrease for 15 by 2080. Averaged centroids of suitable habitat (all species) were projected to shift tens (up to hundreds) of kilometers. Herbs showed a small-projected response to climate change, while obligate seeders could suffer the greatest losses. Several rare species could lose suitable habitat inside conservation areas while increasing area outside. We concluded that (i) climate change is more important than urban development for vegetation habitat loss in this ecoregion through 2080 due to diminishing amounts of undeveloped private land in this region; (ii) the existing conservation plan, while extensive, may be inadequate to protect plant diversity under projected patterns of climate change and urban development, (iii) regional assessments of the dynamics of the drivers of biodiversity change based on high-resolution environmental data and consensus predictive mapping, such as this study, are necessary to identify the species expected to be the most vulnerable and to meaningfully inform regional-scale conservation.     

Regime shifts in the marine environment: the scientific basis and political context

Regime shifts in the marine environment have recently received much attention. To date, however, few large-scale meta-analyses have been carried out due to insufficient data coverage and integration between sustained observational datasets because of diverse methodologies used in data collection, recording and archival. Here we review the available data on regime shifts globally, followed by a review of current and planned policies with relevance to regime shifts.We then focus on the North and Baltic Seas, providing examples of existing efforts for data integration in the MarBEF Network of Excellence. Existing gaps in data coverage are identified, and the added value from meta-analyses of multiple datasets demonstrated using examples from the MarBEF integrated data project LargeNet. We discuss whether these efforts are addressing current policy needs and close with recommendations for future integrated data networks to increase our ability to understand, identify and predict recent and future regime shifts.