Change in biochemical and morphological characteristics of Lonicera caerulea in tectonically active zone of the Dzhazator River Valley (Altai Mountains)

Local geophysical and geochemical anomalies affect the polymorphism of taste variations, berry shape, and content of some biologically active substances in Lonicera caerulea leaves in the tectonically active Altai Mountains (Dzhazator River basin).     

Estimation of methane fluxes from bottom sediments of Lake Baikal

Methane bubble fluxes in gas flares from bottom sediments in Lake Baikal were estimated for the first time using hydroacoustic methods. Earlier work has demonstrated the occurrence of gas seeps both inside and outside of areas where bottom simulating reflectors were identified in seismic profiles. Fluxes ranged from 14 to 216 tons per year, with the flux for the entire area of the central and southern basins ranging from 1,400 to 2,800 tons per year. Comparison with other water bodies showed that fluxes from the most intensive Baikal flares were similar to those in the Norwegian and Okhotsk seas. Gas hydrates decompose at the lower boundary of the gas hydrate stability zone due to sedimentation. Calculation of the amount of methane produced due to sedimentation gave a total of between 2,600 and 14,000 tons per year for the central and southern basins of the lake. Based on rough estimation, the total flux from shallow- and deep-water gas seeps is similar to the amount of methane produced due to sedimentation. This suggests that gas hydrates possibly occupy much more than 10?% of the pore volume near the base of the gas hydrate stability zone, or that there are other reasons for gas hydrate dissociation and bubble flux from these bottom sediments.     

Authigenic iron oxide formation in the estuarine mixing zone of the Yangtze River

Estuaries are elementary geochemical fronts where river water and seawater mix. Within this mixing zone, iron and other non-conservative elements can undergo complex reactions to form new solid phases. In order to understand authigenic iron oxide formation in the Yangtze River Estuary, two onsite water-mixing sets of experiments were conducted, one by mixing variable amounts of unfiltered Yangtze River water with filtered East China Sea water of different salinity (set 1), the other by mixing variable amounts of filtered Yangtze River water with filtered East China Sea water of different salinity (set 2). In set 2, the minerals newly formed in the course of mixing were investigated by means of a scanning electron microscope fitted with an energy-dispersive X-ray analytical system. It was found that ferrihydrite and lepidocrocite were formed in these mixing experiments, coexisting in nearly equal amounts. These iron oxides appear as aggregated particles with a large grain-size range of several microns to more than 100 μm. The electrolytic properties of seawater played an important role in the formation of these authigenic iron oxides. Kaolinite and organic aggregates were also found in the experimentally mixed pre-filtered waters. Amounts of newly formed suspended matter (set 2) were one to three orders of magnitude lower than those of total suspended matter (TSM) (set 1). This implies that newly formed minerals represent only a very small proportion of TSM in the estuarine mixing zone of the Yangtze River.     

Development of means and methods of drifter technology applied to the problem of the Black Sea research

During the last ten years, autonomous drifting platforms for data collection (drifters) equipped with Argos satellite communication devices have become one of the main components for the observation system in the upper layer of the ocean and surface atmosphere. This article presents the results of the Black Sea drifter monitoring in 2002–2006 within a number of international programs and projects. During this period, about 70 drifters manufactured by NPF Marlin-Yug Ltd. (Sevastopol, Ukraine) were deployed in the western part of the Black Sea. The drifters were mainly standard barometric Lagrangian tracers and a part of them were principally new temperature profiling buoys. Unique long-term data were obtained about the circulation of the surface currents and the dynamics of the temperature stratification within the seasonal thermocline and the cold intermediate layer.     

Physical modeling of long-range infrasonic propagation in the atmosphere

The results of experiments on the physical modeling of long-range infrasonic propagation in the atmosphere are given. Such modeling is based on the possible coincidence between the forms of the vertical profiles of the effective sound speed stratification in the atmospheric boundary layer (between 0 and 600 m for the case under consideration) and in the atmosphere as a whole (from the land surface up to thermospheric heights (about 150 km)). The source of acoustic pulses was an oscillator of detonation type. Owing to the detonation of a gas mixture of air (or oxygen) and propane, this generator was capable of producing short, powerful (the maximum acoustic pressure was on the order of 30 to 60 Pa at a distance of 50 to 100 m from the oscillator), and sufficiently stable acoustic pulses with a spectral maximum at frequencies of 40 to 60 Hz and a pulsing period of 20 to 30 s. The sites of acoustic-signal recording were located at different distances (up to 6.5 km) from the source and in different azimuthal directions. The temperature and wind stratifications were monitored in real time during the experiments with an acoustic locator—a sodar—and a temperature profiler. The data on the physical modeling of long-range sound propagation in the atmosphere are analyzed to verify the physical and mathematical models of predicting acoustic fields in the inhomogeneous moving atmosphere on the basis of the parabolic equation and the method of normal waves. A satisfactory agreement between calculated and experimental data is obtained. One more task was to compare the theoretical relations between variations in the azimuths and angles of tilting of sound rays about the horizon and the parameters of anisotropic turbulence in the lower troposphere and stratosphere with the experimental data. A theoretical interpretation of the experimental results is proposed on the basis of the theory of anisotropic turbulence in the atmosphere. The theoretical and experimental results are compared, and a satisfactory agreement between these results is noted.     

The role of water mass dynamics in controlling bacterial abundance and production in the middle Adriatic Sea

Month-to-month fluctuations in the abundance of bacteria and heterotrophic nanoflagellates (HNF) and bacterial production, as well as various chemical (nutrients, oxygen) and physical (salinity, temperature) parameters were analysed at a station located in the open middle Adriatic Sea during one decade (1997-2006). Being influenced by both coastal waters and open Adriatic circulation in the surface layer, and by the deep Adriatic water masses in the deep layers (100 m), this station is quite suitable for detecting the environmental changes occurring in the open Adriatic Sea with respect to the circulation of its water masses and their long-term changes and anomalies. Multivariate methods were used to identify seasonal and inter-annual changes of the investigated parameters, associating observed changes to the changes in Adriatic water masses and circulation regimes. The analyses showed that bacterial abundance and production were controlled by different water mass dynamics during 1997-2001 compared to 2002-2006 period, particularly noticeable in different seasonal patterns of biological parameters. The interplay between North Adriatic Dense Water (NAdDW) and Levantine Intermediate Water (LIW) resulted in a change in the available nutrients (NAdDW is poor in orthophosphates), and as a consequence different bacterial abundance and production. A few periods were examined in detail, such as 2004, when LIW inflow was particularly strong and was accompanied by an increase of bacterial and HNF abundances, as well as of bacterial production.     

Rapid invasion of Crassostrea gigas into the German Wadden Sea dominated by larval supply

Invasions of non-indigenous species into coastal habitats have been a frequent phenomenon in the last decades, sometimes with significant impact on the receiving ecosystem. However, the understanding of the entire process and especially the relative importance of larval supply and local recruitment remains unclear. In this study, we simulate the invasion of a benthic invertebrate into a previously uncolonised habitat over several years and validate the results with field data. Therefore, we present field data from a monitoring programme revealing the rapid invasion of the oyster Crassostrea gigas into the East Frisian Wadden Sea, North Sea, between 2003 and 2005. The applied model combines a simple, spatially-explicit population dynamics model for the adult stage with a particle tracking model for the larval stage of the life cycle. Simulation results are able to reproduce the large-scale pattern of the field data and indicate a domination of larval supply on the population dynamics in the early stage of the invasion. Though monitoring and simulations suggest a single larval source outside the study area in the west, the population dynamics in the eastern part is only explainable with an additional source within the study area attributed to an unintentional input of juveniles by mussel fishery. High sensitivities to uncertain parameters result in distinct deviations between monitoring and simulations at particular sites. Especially the impact of site-specific variations of the post-settlement mortality underlines the variability of local recruitment conditions and indicates the need for spatially resolved information for exact predictions.     

Assessing the extent of mangrove change caused by Cyclone Vance in the eastern Exmouth Gulf, northwestern Australia

Changes in mangal area were quantified in the eastern Exmouth Gulf over six years (1999–2004) after Cyclone Vance using Landsat TM satellite imagery and aerial photography. Vance was the strongest tropical cyclone ever to impact the Australian mainland before 2006 and produced wind gusts of more than 280 km h⁻¹. Image data were processed using ENVI™ and IDRISI™ software. Three sets of Landsat TM images from 1999 (a few days before the cyclone), 2002 and 2004 were used, along with 2004 digital aerial photography. A ‘common’ subset of 904 km² was selected from all images and classification was developed using ISODATA™ unsupervised classification to identify spectrally distinct areas followed by principal component analysis (PCA), vegetation indices and supervised classification. Some 12,800 ha of mangrove habitat was present before the cyclone and approximately 5700 ha (44%) was removed by it. Most mangroves lost (74%) between 1999 and 2004 were converted either to bare sediment or to live saltmarshes and this occurred mostly between 1999 and 2002. Five basic categories of damage were conspicuous from imagery and field observations, and evidence suggests that much of the loss was due to the longer term consequences of sediment deposition or smothering, rather than the immediate effects of wind or waves. Mangroves exhibited accelerated recovery between 2002 and 2004, and around 1580 ha regenerated during this time, amounting to a return of 68% of their former coverage. At this recovery rate we estimate that they should have returned to their pre-cyclone area by 2009. Over half of the saltmarsh habitats (54%) were removed by the cyclone (4060 ha) but their recovery has been far more rapid than mangroves. After 5 years, saltmarshes had returned to 87% of their previous area. The 5700 ha of mangrove habitat damaged by Cyclone Vance exceeds any anthropogenic impact that has ever taken place in Western Australia by several orders of magnitude.     

Morphodynamic response of a two-barred beach to a shoreface nourishment

The response to a shoreface nourishment of the two-bar system at Noordwijk (the Netherlands) is analyzed based on a daily data set of time-exposure video images collected during about 6 years, complemented with topographic and bathymetric surveys. The 1.7 Mm³ nourishment, implemented as a 3 km alongshore bump seaward of the outer bar, migrated more than 300 m onshore in 4 years before losing its integrity. Furthermore, the nourishment interrupted the autonomous seaward migration of both bars for the entire duration of the study period and, allaying earlier fears, did not intensify the three-dimensional patterns in the bars, such as the crescentic plan-shape and rip channels. The nourishment did result in clear head effects on both flanks, with the bar becoming discontinuous and the flank section decaying or becoming attached to an offshore-located bar, while the section of bar landward of the nourishment became attached to a landward-located bar. This sequence of morphologies is known as bar switching. Each switching episode took almost one year to complete and can therefore not be ascribed to individual wave events. We suspect that shoreface nourishments enhance the possibility of bar switching by creating alongshore variability in the position and depth of the outer bar and in its cross-shore migration rate and direction. The Noordwijk nourishment did not influence the shoreline position as its trend did not undergo distinctive variations after 1998. Differences in the response of the Noordwijk sandbars to the shoreface nourishment compared with other Dutch nourishments are attributed to the location and size (volume per unit length) of the nourishment with respect to the sandbars and to the median grain size of the nourished material.     

Sediment transport patterns at Trafalgar offshore windfarm

A simple analytical model of wave propagation has been developed in order to study the potential sediment transport patterns due to the action of currents and waves in the neighborhood of cylindrical structures as well inside a group of these structures. The attention is focused on the study of Trafalgar offshore windfarm, a case in which it has been necessary to analyze the flow trough porous structures in order to model fish growing-cages planned to be installed at each aerogenerator structure. The results are obtained by averaging over one period of wave in order to evaluate the net potential sediment transport. The analysis of the results reveals how the processes of wave diffraction and reflection give rise to periodic patterns of sediment transport around and between the structures.