All posts; Tags Include "Marine Biology"
- September 9, 2010
- 11:15 AM
- 16 views
Hawksbill Hope
by Journal Watch Online in Journal Watch Online
Things may not be as bleak as they once seemed for one endangered sea turtle. A new survey finds that hawksbill turtles are more widespread in the eastern Pacific than earlier studies had suggested. Still, the “comparatively optimistic” findings still show that the turtle continues to be highly endangered and will need help to survive. […] Read More »... Read more »
Gaos, A., Abreu-Grobois, F., Alfaro-Shigueto, J., Amorocho, D., Arauz, R., Baquero, A., Briseño, R., Chacón, D., Dueñas, C., Hasbún, C.... (2010) Signs of hope in the eastern Pacific: international collaboration reveals encouraging status for the severely depleted population of hawksbill turtles Eretmochelys imbricata. Oryx, 1-7. DOI: 10.1017/S0030605310000773
- September 9, 2010
- 09:19 AM
- 20 views
Human sacrifices, uranium, and corals
by Uncharted Atolls in Uncharted Atolls
The development of shrines and temple architecture associated with chiefdoms and early states is thought to be a slow process. In Mesoamerica, a sequence of architectural evolution took 1300 years, according to archaeological evidence. However, this may not always be … Continue reading →... Read more »
Sharp, W., Kahn, J., Polito, C., & Kirch, P. (2010) Rapid evolution of ritual architecture in central Polynesia indicated by precise 230Th/U coral dating. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 107(30), 13234-13239. DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1005063107
- September 9, 2010
- 08:00 AM
- 19 views
Eating your own brain: Ocean of Pseudoscience repost
by Zen Faulkes in NeuroDojo
Southern Fried Scientist decided to feature a week of surreal science related to the oceans. I take this opportunity to be a lazy blogger and repost this piece (slightly rewritten) from May 2008.
Adult sea squirts (also known as tunicates or ascidians) are sessile animals. As adults, they really don't move. But if anyone has heard about sea squirts, they’ve probably hear that little sea squirts start life as smart little tadpoles, searching this way and that for a place to land. Once they’v........ Read more »
Mackie GO, & Burighel P. (2005) The nervous system in adult tunicates: current research directions. Canadian Journal of Zoology, 83(1), 151-183. DOI: 10.1139/z04-177
Meinertzhagen IA, & Okamura Y. (2001) The larval ascidian nervous system: the chordate brain from its small beginnings . Trends in Neurosciences, 24(7), 401-410. DOI: 10.1016/S0166-2236(00)01851-8
- September 8, 2010
- 04:00 PM
- 27 views
First New Snail Larval Form Discovered Since 1878
by Kevin Zelnio in Deep Sea News
What hid’st thou in thy treasure-caves and cells?
Thou hollow-sounding and mysterious main!
- Pale glistening pearls, and rainbow-colour’d shells,
Bright things which gleam unreck’d-of, and in vain!
- Keep, keep thy riches, melancholy sea!
We ask not such from thee
Felicia Hemans, 1827 The Treasures of the Deep
Just when you think you have the basics down, just when you show signs . . . → Read More: First New Snail Larval Form Discovered Since 1878... Read more »
Kyle C. Reynolds, Hiromi Watanabe, Ellen E. Strong, Takenori Sasaki, Katsuyuki Uematsu, Hiroshi Miyake, Shigeaki Kojima, Yohey Suzuki, Katsunori Fujikura, Stacy Kim.... (2010) New Molluscan Larval Form: Brooding and Development in a Hydrothermal Vent Gastropod, Ifremeria nautilei (Provannidae). Biological Bulletin, 219(1), 7-11. info:/
- September 8, 2010
- 04:00 PM
- 31 views
Our favorite sea monsters – The Giant Manta Special Edition
by Southern Fried Scientist in Southern Fried Science
Sea Monsters, mythical beasts of legend and lore that ply the world’s oceans, sinking ships, terrifying sailors, swallowing entire crews whole. Sea monsters occupy a special place in our imagination. The ocean is huge, unfathomable. Of course mighty beast could dwell within, undetected.
Every once in a long while, the myths, the legends, the stories, turn [...]... Read more »
ANDREA D. MARSHALL1, LEONARD J.V. COMPAGNO, & MICHAEL B. BENNETT1. (2009) Redescription of the genus Manta with resurrection of Manta alfredi (Krefft, 1868) (Chondrichthyes; Myliobatoidei; Mobulidae). Zootaxa. info:/
- September 8, 2010
- 12:25 PM
- 30 views
Maximum (un)Sustainable Yield
by Bluegrass Blue Crab in Southern Fried Science
In 1954 and 1957 Gordon and Schaefer respectively described the idea of maximum sustainable yield (MSY) – that is, the amount of fish that could be taken by commercial fishing operations to maximize reproduction by the system year after year. Since then, it has been heralded as the mathematical panacea to fisheries management.
Gordon and Schaefer [...]... Read more »
Gordon, H. (1954) The Economic Theory of a Common-Property Resource: The Fishery. Journal of Political Economy, 62(2), 124. DOI: 10.1086/257497
- September 8, 2010
- 11:03 AM
- 49 views
Ocean of Pseudoscience Shorty – Can methane bubbles sink ships?
by Southern Fried Scientist in Southern Fried Science
One of the often cited causes for ships that mysteriously and quickly disappear are methane bubbles, released from sub-seafloor gas pockets. The story goes that as methane rises to the surface, the bubbles cause the density of seawater to drop, and any ships in the area suddenly lose buoyancy and spontaneously sink. This effect has [...]... Read more »
May, D., & Monaghan, J. (2003) Can a single bubble sink a ship?. American Journal of Physics, 71(9), 842. DOI: 10.1119/1.1582187
Hueschen, M. (2010) Can bubbles sink ships?. American Journal of Physics, 78(2), 139. DOI: 10.1119/1.3263819
- September 8, 2010
- 09:05 AM
- 21 views
Getting out of their depth: How rockfish speciate without physical barriers
by Jeremy Yoder in Denim and Tweed
Most evolutionary biologists believe that the easiest means for two populations to become reproductively isolated—a first step to splitting into different species—is a physical barrier to movement. Mountain ranges, deep river valleys, or the sheer distance between an island and the mainland—the opportunities for allopatric speciation are all over the place. Unless, of course, you remember that the planet's largest habitat is the ocean, and there aren't such obvious physical barriers out at........ Read more »
Ingram, T. (2010) Speciation along a depth gradient in a marine adaptive radiation. Proc. Royal Soc. B. info:/10.1098/rspb.2010.1127
- September 7, 2010
- 11:11 PM
- 24 views
Ocean of Pseudoscience: “Voracious Beyond Belief”
by Chuck in Ya Like Dags?
I’ll write my first epic Ocean of Pseudoscience post by touching on a subject near and dear to my small shark-loving heart, and in fact it’s the focus of my thesis research. Ask any commercial fisherman (and even some scientists) … Continue reading →... Read more »
Richard J. Beamish, Barbara L. Thomson, & Gordan A. McFarlane. (1992) Spiny dogfish predation on chinook and coho salmon and the potential effects on hatchery-produced salmon. Transactions of the American Fisheries Society, 444-455. info:/
- September 7, 2010
- 12:30 PM
- 42 views
Bone-eating worms and contorted creationist thinking
by Southern Fried Scientist in Southern Fried Science
I tend to avoid the creationist blogs. Every time I get sucked into that vortex of pseudoscience, I find the exact same debunked claims that were bunk when I was 12. There are better bloggers out there who have the energy and patience to systematically dissect the same tired old rubbish day after day, but I’m [...]... Read more »
Jones WJ, Johnson SB, Rouse GW, & Vrijenhoek RC. (2008) Marine worms (genus Osedax) colonize cow bones. Proceedings. Biological sciences / The Royal Society, 275(1633), 387-91. PMID: 18077256
Rouse, G., Wilson, N., Goffredi, S., Johnson, S., Smart, T., Widmer, C., Young, C., & Vrijenhoek, R. (2008) Spawning and development in Osedax boneworms (Siboglinidae, Annelida). Marine Biology, 156(3), 395-405. DOI: 10.1007/s00227-008-1091-z
Vrijenhoek, R., Collins, P., & Van Dover, C. (2008) Bone-eating marine worms: habitat specialists or generalists?. Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 275(1646), 1963-1964. DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2008.0350
Glover AG, Kemp KM, Smith CR, & Dahlgren TG. (2008) On the role of bone-eating worms in the degradation of marine vertebrate remains. Proceedings. Biological sciences / The Royal Society, 275(1646), 1959. PMID: 18505721
Haag, A. (2005) Marine biology: Whale fall. Nature, 433(7026), 566-567. DOI: 10.1038/433566a
Goffredi SK, Orphan VJ, Rouse GW, Jahnke L, Embaye T, Turk K, Lee R, & Vrijenhoek RC. (2005) Evolutionary innovation: a bone-eating marine symbiosis. Environmental microbiology, 7(9), 1369-78. PMID: 16104860
Kiel, S., Goedert, J., Kahl, W., & Rouse, G. (2010) Fossil traces of the bone-eating worm Osedax in early Oligocene whale bones. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 107(19), 8656-8659. DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1002014107
- September 7, 2010
- 11:00 AM
- 34 views
Chemistry of the Great Big Blue: Nutrients
by Bluegrass Blue Crab in Southern Fried Science
The Great Big Blue looks like it contains nothing but water and maybe a little salt, especially out in the open ocean. However, this kind of sparse environment is exactly where the chemistry matters the most – it’s a fine line between not enough, too much, and just right. Given this, there’s no distinct [...]... Read more »
HECKY, R., & KILHAM, P. (1988) Nutrient limitation of phytoplankton in freshwater and marine environments: A review of recent evidence on the effects of enrichment. Limnology and Oceanography, 33(4_part_2), 796-822. DOI: 10.4319/lo.1988.33.4_part_2.0796
Howarth, R. (1988) Nutrient Limitation of Net Primary Production in Marine Ecosystems. Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics, 19(1), 89-110. DOI: 10.1146/annurev.es.19.110188.000513
Behrenfeld, M., Bale, A., Kolber, Z., Aiken, J., & Falkowski, P. (1996) Confirmation of iron limitation of phytoplankton photosynthesis in the equatorial Pacific Ocean. Nature, 383(6600), 508-511. DOI: 10.1038/383508a0
Fanning, K. (1989) Influence of atmospheric pollution on nutrient limitation in the ocean. Nature, 339(6224), 460-463. DOI: 10.1038/339460a0
- September 6, 2010
- 10:02 PM
- 48 views
If Molluscs Could Communicate What Would They Say?
by Dr. M in Deep Sea News
Why don’t animal’s use wheels in locomotion? Why aren’t blue whales bigger? Why are there no freshwater starfish? Why are there no tree dwelling cephalopods? Why can’t my dog make a decent cocktail? These are the kinds of questions that intrigue me. Apparently I am not alone.
Geerat Vermeij’s new paper “Sound reasons for . . . → Read More: If Molluscs Could Communicate What Would They Say?... Read more »
Christopher L. Kitting. (1979) The use of feeding noises to determine the algal foods being consumed by individual intertidal molluscs. Oecologia, 1-17. DOI: 10.1007/BF00388806
GEERAT J. VERMEIJ. (2010) Sound reasons for silence: why do molluscs not communicate acoustically?. Biological Journal of the Linnean Society, 485-493. DOI: 10.1111/j.1095-8312.2010.01443.x
- September 6, 2010
- 04:11 PM
- 80 views
Follow Dr. Bik to the Gulf!
by Holly Bik in Deep Sea News
Remember Dr. M’s recent disturbing post about the quelling of independent science in the Gulf? I can now officially announce that my lab was one of the recipients of the rapid response research grants awarded by the National Science Foundation—hurrah! I’m the postdoc assigned to this project, which aims to characterize pre-spill meiofaunal community structure in . . . → Read More: Follow Dr. Bik to the Gulf!... Read more »
De Troch, M.D., et al. (2006) Resource availability and meiofauna in sediment of tropical seagrass beds: Local versus global trends. Marine Environmental Research, 61(1), 59-73. DOI: 10.1016/j.marenvres.2005.05.003
- September 6, 2010
- 12:30 PM
- 376 views
Greenwashing – Is there really a sustainable Orange Roughy fishery?
by Southern Fried Scientist in Southern Fried Science
Wandering through the grocery store the other day, I noticed something strange in the fish bin. Now, in general I’m pretty conscious of where my fish comes from, how it was caught, whether the fishery as a whole or the specific population is sustainable. I pay attention to those details and I can usually tell [...]... Read more »
Clark, M. (2001) Are deepwater fisheries sustainable? — the example of orange roughy (Hoplostethus atlanticus) in New Zealand. Fisheries Research, 51(2-3), 123-135. DOI: 10.1016/S0165-7836(01)00240-5
- September 2, 2010
- 09:50 PM
- 62 views
Shore Crab, Sea Squirts, and Alzheimer's Disease
by Joris van Alphen in Joris van Alphen Photography Blog
(...) Although these adult sea squirts, or tunicates, don't consist of much more than translucent sacks with intestines, their larval "tadpole" stage exhibits all characteristics of the chordates. This means that they are actually more closely related to us chordate humans than this crab is!
In fact, transparent sea squirts are so similar to us that they may prove to be important for the development of more effective treatments for Alzheimer's disease.... Read more »
Michael J. Virata, & Robert W. Zeller. (2010) Ascidians: an invertebrate chordate model to study Alzheimer's disease pathogenesis. Disease Models , 377-385. DOI: 10.1242/dmm.003434
- September 2, 2010
- 11:02 AM
- 41 views
War & Fish
by Journal Watch Online in Journal Watch Online
War isn’t the answer — but it wasn’t so bad if you were a Scottish haddock. A 6-year pause in commercial fishing caused by World War II helped cod, haddock and whiting populations in Europe’s North Sea recover from years of pre-war exploitation, according to a new analysis. The “accidental” reserve suggests that cold-water fish […] Read More »... Read more »
Doug Beare , & Eddie McKenzie . (2010) An unintended experiment in fisheries science: a marine area protected by war results in Mexican waves in fish numbers-at-age. Naturwissenschaften. DOI: 10.1007/s00114-010-0696-5
- September 1, 2010
- 08:37 AM
- 50 views
Dispersants! Part III: Do dispersants really promote degradation of oil?
by Holly Bik in Deep Sea News
Promoting microbial degradation of oil has been one of the main arguments in favor of dispersant use. Interestingly, the PWSRCAC review (covering literature from 1997-2008) did not identify any recent study that explicitly found dispersant use enhancing the biodegradation of oil. Actually, ~50% of studies found that chemical additives inhibited microbial degradation and the other half . . . → Read More: Dispersants! Part III: Do dispersants really promote degradation of oil?... Read more »
Venosa AD, & Holder EL. (2007) Biodegradability of dispersed crude oil at two different temperatures. Marine pollution bulletin, 54(5), 545-53. PMID: 17316707
Yoshida A, Nomura H, Toyoda K, Nishino T, Seo Y, Yamada M, Nishimura M, Wada M, Okamoto K, Shibata A.... (2006) Microbial responses using denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis to oil and chemical dispersant in enclosed ecosystems. Marine pollution bulletin, 52(1), 89-95. PMID: 16202430
- August 31, 2010
- 09:18 PM
- 59 views
The Wednesday Post - Frogs and Antibiotics!
by James Byrne in Disease of the Week
A meeting of the American Chemical Society last week a group of researchers from the United Arab Emirates University presented some data showing they had collected and analysed frog skin compounds that elicited an anti-microbial effects from a wide range of species.... Read more »
Blaustein, A., & Kiesecker, J. (2002) Complexity in conservation: lessons from the global decline of amphibian populations. Ecology Letters, 5(4), 597-608. DOI: 10.1046/j.1461-0248.2002.00352.x
Smet, K., & Contreras, R. (2005) Human Antimicrobial Peptides: Defensins, Cathelicidins and Histatins. Biotechnology Letters, 27(18), 1337-1347. DOI: 10.1007/s10529-005-0936-5
- August 31, 2010
- 08:50 PM
- 49 views
Seabird Bycatch via Deep Sea Longlines is Vastly Understated
by Michael Long in Phased
Eric Gilman (Hawaii Pacific University, United States) and coworkers' 15-year study strongly suggests that deep sea longlines understate seabird bycatch by approximately 50%, reinforcing the serious threat to birds posed by longline fisheries. This news feature was written on August 31, 2010.... Read more »
Brothers, N., Duckworth, A. R., Safina, C., & Gilman, E. L. (2010) Seabird Bycatch in Pelagic Longline Fisheries Is Grossly Underestimated when Using Only Haul Data. PLoS ONE, 5(8). info:/10.1371/journal.pone.0012491
- August 31, 2010
- 08:33 PM
- 49 views
The Wednesday Post (1/9/10)
by James in Disease of the Week
Enough of vaccines for a moment. I want to talk about frogs, frogs and antimicrobial agents. Normally I find it hard to remain interested in anything with a central nervous system but recently two frog related stories have caught my eye. First was this little dude. Are you kidding me, that thing is tiny. Sometimes [...]... Read more »
Blaustein, A., & Kiesecker, J. (2002) Complexity in conservation: lessons from the global decline of amphibian populations. Ecology Letters, 5(4), 597-608. DOI: 10.1046/j.1461-0248.2002.00352.x
Smet, K., & Contreras, R. (2005) Human Antimicrobial Peptides: Defensins, Cathelicidins and Histatins. Biotechnology Letters, 27(18), 1337-1347. DOI: 10.1007/s10529-005-0936-5
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