ALBERT

Description: The reliability of Arctic climate predictions is currently hampered by insufficient knowledge of natural climate variability in the past. A sediment core from Lake El'gygytgyn (NE Russia) provides a continuous high-resolution record from the Arctic spaning the past 2.8 Ma. The core reveals numerous "super interglacials" during the Quaternary, with maximum summer temperatures and annual precipitation during marine benthic isotope stages (MIS) 11c and 31 ~4-5 °C and ~300 mm higher than those of MIS 1 and 5e. Climate simulations show these extreme warm conditions are difficult to explain with greenhouse gas and astronomical forcing alone, implying the importance of amplifying feedbacks and far field influences. The timing of Arctic warming relative to West Antarctic Ice Sheet retreats implies strong interhemispheric climate connectivity.

Description: It is essential to predict the impact of elevated PCO2 on marine organisms and habitats to anticipate the severity and consequences of future ocean chemistry change. Despite the importance of carry-over effects in the evolutionary history of marine organisms, few studies have considered links between life-history stages when determining how marine organisms will respond to elevated PCO2, and none have considered the link between adults and their offspring. Herein, we exposed adults of wild and selectively bred Sydney rock oysters, Saccostrea glomerata to elevated PCO2 during reproductive conditioning and measured the development, growth and survival response of their larvae. We found that elevated PCO2 had a negative impact on larvae of S. glomerata causing a reduction in growth, rate of development and survival. Exposing adults to elevated PCO2 during reproductive conditioning, however, had positive carry-over effects on larvae. Larvae spawned from adults exposed to elevated PCO2 were larger and developed faster, but displayed similar survival compared with larvae spawned from adults exposed to ambient PCO2. Furthermore, selectively bred larvae of S. glomerata were more resilient to elevated PCO2 than wild larvae. Measurement of the standard metabolic rate (SMR) of adult S. glomerata showed that at ambient PCO2, SMR is increased in selectively bred compared with wild oysters and is further increased during exposure to elevated PCO2. This study suggests that sensitive marine organisms may have the capacity to acclimate or adapt to elevated PCO2 over the next century and a change in energy turnover indicated by SMR may be a key process involved.

Description: In Gobabeb, Namibia SWD, LWD and DIR are each measured redundant with two instruments of the same make (not in this data base). The differences between the pairs are used in the quality control. This is done manually by inspecting plots of half-day diurnal courses of the pairs and their differences. Values are removed mostly in the morning due to daily cleaning. Other reasons for larger differences are birds, insects, or people at the station. There are regular fog events varying in frequency over the year. Usually, the fog appears in the second half of the night and disappears a few hours after sunrise. The case temperatures of pyrgeometers practically never drop below dewpoint but there can be water deposition of the dome.