Zoogeography of marine Bryozoa around South Africa

The zoogeography of marine Bryozoa around South Africa was investigated using published distribution records, museum catalogues, and an examination of previously unworked bryozoan material in (mostly) museum collections. Although a total of 276 valid species are recognised, it was not possible to unambiguously assess geographic patterns of diversity. At all depth zones examined (shore and inner-shelf, 0–30 m; mid- and outer-shelf, 31–350 m; bathyal, >500 m), there was a clear geographic structure to communities that mirrored established regional patterns of biogeography. Too few samples were collected from the shelf edge (351–500 m) and they were consequently excluded from zoogeographic analysis. Communities on the shore and inner-shelf and on the mid- and outer-shelf were more similar to each other than they were to bathyal communities, and the pronounced structure in bathyal communities suggests heterogeneity in the deep sea around South Africa.     

Environmental responses of jellyfish polyps as drivers of medusa populations off the coast of Namibia

Jellyfish populations in the southeastern Atlantic off the coast of Namibia have increased subsequent to the decline of small pelagic fisheries at the end of the 1960s, although the environment there has also become warmer and the waters off Walvis Bay have become richer in zooplankton in recent years. Laboratory experiments were conducted with the scyphozoan jellyfish Chrysaora fulgida to investigate the effects of food density (0, 30, 70, 100 or 150 Artemia nauplii 200 ml^?1), feeding frequency (once daily or once every third day) and water temperature (12, 16 or 20 °C) on the asexual reproduction, growth and development of polyps. The results of a generalised linear mixed-effects model reveal that all variables impacted asexual reproduction, with greater polyp production attained at higher food concentrations, increased feeding frequencies and increased temperatures. The most common mode of asexual reproduction was by lateral budding. These laboratory results suggest that polyps of C. fulgida may have proliferated off Namibia in recent times, which would contribute to increased numbers of jellyfish there.     

Circular,Stationary Profiles Emerging in Unidirectional Abrasion

Models of moving interfaces, especially those with stable soliton-like behavior, are of central importance in many areas of physics, for example, surface growth models, chemical waves, and more. Here described for the first time in a realistic geophysical context is a partial differential equation model of bedrock abrasion by unidirectional impacts generalizing earlier pioneering work on pebble shapes by Bloore who treated isotropic impacts (Bloore in Math. Geol. 9:113–122, 1977). The result is a simple geometrical partial differential equation exhibiting circular arcs as solitary wave profiles. The latter seem to be the first known analytic solutions on Bloore-type models. Solitonic behavior, although familiar in many areas of physics, appears not to have been encountered in the geophysical literature. Not only are the existence and stability of these stationary, traveling shapes demonstrated here by numerical experiments based on finite difference approximations, but it is also shown that the results received here are consistent with recent laboratory experiments. The simulations within show that, depending on initial profile shape and other parameters, these circular profiles may evolve via long transients, which in a geological setting, may appear as noncircular stationary profiles.     

CTBT seismic monitoring using coherent and incoherent array processing

Journal of Seismology - The detection and location capability of the International Monitoring System for small seismic events in the continental and oceanic regions surrounding the Sea of Japan is...