The Boston Globe
Scores of rare turtles found stranded on Cape
Wellfleet Bay Wildlife Sanctuary
Rescuers placed cold-stunned turtles in fruit boxes.Read More Here
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Showing posts with label Seas/Oceans. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Seas/Oceans. Show all posts
Wednesday, December 23, 2015
Monday, May 19, 2014
A Team of Scientists is Exploring A Dangerous Underwater Volcano in Caribbean to Determine if it Could Cause a US Tsunami
Could Dangerous Underwater Volcano in Caribbean Cause a US Tsunami?
Kick'em Jenny is a dangerous and active volcano sitting roughly 6,000 feet below the surface of the Caribbean Sea, and located off the coast of the island of Grenada, south of St. Lucia.
Robert Ballard, famous for discovering the Titanic 12,000 feet below the surface of the icy North Atlantic in 1985, set his sights on exploring the Kick'em Jenny to study its eruption history and learn more about how underwater volcanoes can pose a threat.
Ballard, the president of The Ocean Exploration Trust and the director of the Center for Ocean Exploration at the University of Rhode Island’s Graduate School of Oceanography, said the Kick'em Jenny volcano has a history of explosive eruptions, which could have the potential to trigger tsunamis, the effects from which could be felt as far away as the northeastern United States.
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Sunday, May 4, 2014
National Science Foundation : Viruses wage war on deep-sea bacteria to essentially feed and propagate
Undersea warfare: Viruses hijack deep-sea bacteria at hydrothermal vents
Date:
May 1, 2014
Source:
National Science Foundation
Summary:
More
than a mile beneath the ocean's surface, as dark clouds of mineral-rich
water billow from seafloor hot springs called hydrothermal vents,
unseen armies of viruses and bacteria wage war.
Credit: NOAA
[Click to enlarge image]
More
than a mile beneath the ocean's surface, as dark clouds of mineral-rich
water billow from seafloor hot springs called hydrothermal vents,
unseen armies of viruses and bacteria wage war.
Like
pirates boarding a treasure-laden ship, the viruses infect bacterial
cells to get the loot: tiny globules of elemental sulfur stored inside
the bacterial cells.
Instead of absconding with their prize, the viruses force the bacteria to burn their valuable sulfur reserves, then use the unleashed energy to replicate.
"Our findings suggest that viruses in the dark oceans indirectly access vast energy sources in the form of elemental sulfur," said University of Michigan marine microbiologist and oceanographer Gregory Dick, whose team collected DNA from deep-sea microbes in seawater samples from hydrothermal vents in the Western Pacific Ocean and the Gulf of California.
"We suspect that these viruses are essentially hijacking bacterial cells and getting them to consume elemental sulfur so the viruses can propagate themselves," said Karthik Anantharaman of the University of Michigan, first author of a paper on the findings published this week in the journal Science Express.
Similar microbial interactions have been observed in shallow ocean waters between photosynthetic bacteria and the viruses that prey upon them.
But this is the first time such a relationship has been seen in a chemosynthetic system, one in which the microbes rely solely on inorganic compounds, rather than sunlight, as their energy source.
"Viruses play a cardinal role in biogeochemical processes in ocean shallows," said David Garrison, a program director in the National Science Foundation's (NSF) Division of Ocean Sciences, which funded the research. "They may have similar importance in deep-sea thermal vent environments."
Read More Here
Instead of absconding with their prize, the viruses force the bacteria to burn their valuable sulfur reserves, then use the unleashed energy to replicate.
"Our findings suggest that viruses in the dark oceans indirectly access vast energy sources in the form of elemental sulfur," said University of Michigan marine microbiologist and oceanographer Gregory Dick, whose team collected DNA from deep-sea microbes in seawater samples from hydrothermal vents in the Western Pacific Ocean and the Gulf of California.
"We suspect that these viruses are essentially hijacking bacterial cells and getting them to consume elemental sulfur so the viruses can propagate themselves," said Karthik Anantharaman of the University of Michigan, first author of a paper on the findings published this week in the journal Science Express.
Similar microbial interactions have been observed in shallow ocean waters between photosynthetic bacteria and the viruses that prey upon them.
But this is the first time such a relationship has been seen in a chemosynthetic system, one in which the microbes rely solely on inorganic compounds, rather than sunlight, as their energy source.
"Viruses play a cardinal role in biogeochemical processes in ocean shallows," said David Garrison, a program director in the National Science Foundation's (NSF) Division of Ocean Sciences, which funded the research. "They may have similar importance in deep-sea thermal vent environments."
Read More Here
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Thursday, April 17, 2014
A single strain of marine bacteria called Alteromonas may consume as much dissolved carbon in the ocean as an entire, diverse bacterial community, according to a new study.
Unusual Bacteria Gobbles Up Carbon in the Ocean
By Agata Blaszczak-Boxe, Staff Writer | April 14, 2014 06:58pm ET
 |
| Underneath the floating debris in the Pacific Ocean. Credit: NOAA - Marine Debris Program. |
A single strain of marine bacteria called Alteromonas may consume as much dissolved carbon in the ocean as an entire, diverse bacterial community, according to a new study.
The finding may help researchers better understand how carbon cycling works in marine ecosystems.
"We found that an individual bacterial strain was capable of consuming the same amount of carbon in the ocean as diverse [bacterial] communities," said study author Byron E. Pedler at the University of California, San Diego.
The researchers found the results surprising because of the immense diversity of molecules that constitute dissolved carbon in one form or another in the ocean, Pedler told Live Science.
Those molecules include both "young" carbon recently produced by phytoplankton — the tiny organisms that are the foundation of the marine food web, and really old carbon that is hundreds of years old. Some of this carbon consists of carbohydrates, but a significant portion of it "is simply uncharacterizable, in that even modern chemical techniques cannot determine what it is," Pedler said.
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Thursday, March 20, 2014
Oceana Report Exposes Nine of the Dirtiest U.S. Fisheries
Oceana Report Sheds Light On Staggering By-Catch Problem In U.S. Fisheries
Posted:
Updated:
That fish dish at your favorite neighborhood bistro may be hiding a gruesome secret.
"When you buy fish at a grocery store or restaurant, you might also be getting a side order of sea turtle or dolphin to go with it," said Dominique Cano-Stocco, Oceana's campaign director of responsible fishing, referring to the large number of dead sea creatures tossed by fishermen each year.
According to a new Oceana report, United States fisheries discard about 17 percent to 22 percent of everything they catch every year. That amounts to a whopping 2 billion pounds of annual by-catch -- injured and dead fish and other marine animals unintentionally caught by fishermen and then thrown overboard. This includes endangered creatures like whales and sharks, as well as commercially viable fish that may have been too young or too damaged to bring to port.
"By-catch is one of the biggest challenges facing the U.S. today," Cano-Stocco said. "It's one of the largest threats to the proper management of our fisheries and to the health of our oceans and marine ecosystems." Due to underreporting, by-catch numbers are probably an underestimate, she explained.
Released Friday, Oceana's report strives to highlight the need to document by-catch numbers and develop better management strategies to prevent the high level of unnecessary slaughter in our oceans.
The report identifies nine of the worst by-catch fisheries in the nation. These fisheries -- defined as groups of fishermen that target a certain kind of fish using a particular kind of fishing gear in a specific region -- are reportedly responsible for more than half of all domestic by-catch; however, they're only responsible for about 7 percent of the fish brought to land, the report notes.
Some of these fisheries reportedly discard more fish than they keep; others are said to throw out large amounts of the very fish species they aim to catch. California fishermen who use drift gillnets (walls of netting that drift in the water) to capture swordfish, for example, reportedly throw out about 63 percent of their total catch.
Between 2008 and 2012, about 39,000 common molas, 6,000 sharks, as well as hundreds of seals, sea lions and dolphins, were seriously injured or killed in the California drift gillnet fishery, Oceana notes.
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Tuesday, March 11, 2014
Fracking Fluids Dumped Into The Ocean Off California Coast
missingsky102
Published on Mar 7, 2014
Fracking fluids dumped into the oceanEnvironmentalists are trying to convince the EPA to ban the dumping of fracking fluids, in federal waters off the California coast. The Center for Biological Diversity claims that at least a dozen off shore rigs in Southern California are dumping wastewater right into the Pacific. RT's Ramon Galindo has the story.
Find RT America in your area: http://rt.com/where-to-watch/
Or watch us online: http://rt.com/on-air/rt-america-air/
RT's Ramon Galindo talks about a recent legal petition by environmental groups in California calling for the Federal government to force an end to the practice of offshore fracking, and the dumping of hundreds of millions of gallons of fracking waste in the ocean every year.
Abby Martin calls out Exxon CEO Rex Tillerson for his blatant hypocrisy after filing a lawsuit against a fracking water tower being built near his property.
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Thursday, February 27, 2014
Millions of shellfish are dying off before they can be harvested at Island Scallops
Acidic ocean deadly for Vancouver Island scallop industry
CBC News
Posted: Feb 25, 2014 8:58 PM PT
Last Updated: Feb 26, 2014 7:04 PM PT
High acidity levels in B.C.'s oceans mean millions of the shellfish die before they reach full maturity.
Millions of shellfish are dying off before they can be harvested at Island Scallops, near Parksville, B.C., due to increased acidity levels in the ocean.
One-third of the workforce at Island Scallops — 20 people — are being laid off because the business has lost more than 10 million scallops before they were able to reach maturity since 2009.
"It's obviously kicked our feet out from underneath us," said CEO Rob Saunders.
Island
Scallops, near Parksville, B.C., is laying off 20 employees because
high acidity in the oceans has meant the loss of millions of scallops.
He said low pH levels in the water appear to be the root of the problem.
Read More Here
.....
"Acidic Waters Kill 10 Million Scallops Off Vancouver"
By Kiley Kroh
on
February 26, 2014 at 11:16 am
on
February 26, 2014 at 11:16 am
A worker harvests oysters for Taylor Shellfish
in Washington, another company grappling with the effects of ocean
acidification.
CREDIT: AP Photo/Ted S. Warren, File
Rob Saunders, CEO of Island Scallops, estimates his company has lost three years worth of scallops and $10 million dollars — forcing him to lay off approximately one-third of his staff.
“I’m not sure we are going to stay alive and I’m not sure the oyster industry is going to stay alive,” Saunders told The Parksville Qualicum Beach NEWS. “It’s that dramatic.”
Ocean acidification, often referred to as global warming’s “evil twin,” threatens to upend the delicate balance of marine life across the globe.
Read More Here
.....
Struggling shellfish farmers eye genomic research
Industry looks for answers to cope with rising carbon dioxide levels, increased acidity
High acidity is being blamed for a mass die-off of B.C. scallops.
Oyster and scallop farmers from Oregon right up the coast of British Columbia are experiencing massive die-offs of animals associated with rising carbon dioxide levels and increasing acidity in local waters.
“We’ve been aware of these problems for quite a while and we just have to learn to operate our farms under new parameters,” said Roberta Stevenson, executive director of the B.C. Shellfish Growers Association. “Genomics offers us an opportunity to develop an animal that is more capable of adapting to this new pH level.”
Shellfish farms employ about 1,000 people in mostly rural parts of the coast and generate about $33 million in sales each year, Stevenson said.
Read More Here
.....
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