ALBERT

Description: Cephalopod beaks from the stomach contents of “wandering albatross” (Diomedea exulans L.) chicks from Bird Island, South Georgia, were sampled between May and September in 1983 and 1984. Lower beaks were identified and measured, and allometric data were used to calculated mantle length and biomass of the species consumed. A total of 3421 lower beaks were examined, representing 35 species in the 1983 sample and 45 species in the 1984 sample. Eight of the twenty families contributed over 95% of the biomass. In 1984 there were less Onychoteuthidae and more Ommastrephidae than in 1983 and a decrease in the number of species known to occur south of the Antarctic Polar Front. There was a difference in the size-frequency distribution of the cephalopod diet in the two years; in 1984 there was a higher frequency of intermediate-sized specimens, reflecting the greater importance of ommastrephids, especially Illex sp. The energy content of cephalopods in 1984 may have been greater than in 1983. Serial sampling of cephalopod beaks during the austral winter did not reveal evidence of growth. By the age of 200 d, wandering albatross chicks have consumed a total of approximately 100 kg wet weight of cephalopods each.

Description: Approximately twice-monthly expendable bathythermograph (XBT) sections between Europe and Brazil, are used to characterize trends in the equatorial geostrophic surface currents orthogonal to the sections between September, 1980 and May, 1984. Using mean temperature-salinity relationships the upper layer temperature profiles are converted to density and used to compute 0/300 db dynamic height. Applying a second derivative method, at and near the equator, geostrophic surface currents are computed along each quasimeridional XBT section and time/space series of the equatorial currents are developed using spline interpolations in both time and space. Equatorial currents are mapped as time series of dynamic height and geostrophic current.

Description: Hurricanes and other strong storms can cause important decreases in sea surface temperature by means of vertical mixing within the upper ocean, and by air–sea heat exchange. Here we use satellite-derived infrared images of the western North Atlantic to study sea surface cooling caused by hurricane Gloria (1985). Significant regional variations in sea surface cooling are well correlated with hydrographic conditions. The greatest cooling (up to 5°C) occurred in slope waters north of the Gulf Stream where the seasonal thermocline is shallowest and most compressed; moderate cooling (up to 3 °C) occurred in the open Sargasso Sea where the thermocline is deeper and more diffused; little or no cooling occurred in shallow coastal waters (bottom depth less than 20 m) which were isothermal before the passage of hurricane Gloria. There is a pronounced right-side asymmetry of sea surface cooling with stronger (by a factor of 4) and more extensive (by a factor of 3) cooling found on the right side of the hurricane track. These qualitative results are consistent with the notion that vertical mixing within the upper ocean is the dominant sea surface cooling mechanism of hurricanes.

Description: The squid Nototodarus gouldi (McCoy, 1888) was caught by bottom trawl in Port Phillip Bay, Australia in February 1985. The squid accumulates in its digestive gland high levels of trace metals, with up to 100 μg Cd g-1 dry tissue, 1 200 μg g-1 copper and 1 500 μg g-1 zinc and up to 24 Bq g-1 of the naturally occurring radionuclide polonium-210. The molecular binding of these elements in six squid was investigated using column chromatography. Two poorly resolved copper peaks were associated with proteins of average molecular weights of 11 500 and 18 000. The two squid containing the highest levels of cadmium in their digestive glands (44 and 88 μg g-1) had cadmium associated with a peak of molecular weight intermediate between the copper-binding peaks, but this peak was absent from squid containing lower levels of cadmium. Zinc was associated with ligands of less than 1 500 molecular weight. The 210Po eluted with proteins of greater than 70 000 molecular weight, and there was no evidence of binding to low molecular weight proteins. Different mechanisms appear to be involved in the binding and control of the four elements.

Description: High Arctic meiofaunal distribution, standing stock, sediment chemistry and benthic respiratory activity (determined by sediment oxygen consumption using a shipboard technique) were studied in summer 1980 on the NE Svalbard shelf (northern Barents Sea) and along a transect into the Nansen Basin, over a depth range of 240–3920 m. Particulate sediment proteins, carbohydrates and adenylates were measured as additional measures of benthic biomass. To estimate the sedimentation potential of primary organic matter, sediment bound chloroplastic pigments (chlorophylls, pheopigments) were assayed. Pigment concentrations were found comparable to values in sediments from the boreal and temperate N-Atlantic. Meiofauna, which was abundant on the shelf, decreased in numbers and biomasses with increasing depth, as did sediment proteins, carbohydrates, adenylates and sediment oxygen consumption. Meiofaunal abundances and biomasses within the Nansen Basin were comparable with those observed in abyssal sediments of the North Atlantic. Nematodes clearly dominated in metazoan meiofauna. Protozoans were abundant in shelf sediments. Probably in response to the sedimentation of the plankton bloom, meiofauna abundance and biomass as well as sediment proteins, carbohydrates and adenylates were significantly correlated to the amount of sediment bound chloroplastic pigments, stressing the importance of food quantity to determine benthic stocks. Ninety-four percent of the variance in sediment oxygen consumption were caused by chloroplastic pigments. Benthic respiration, calculated per unit biomass, was 3–10 times lower than in the East Atlantic, suggesting low turnover rates in combination with a high standing stocks for the high Arctic benthos.

Description: There is now clear evidence that changes in the Earth's climate may be sudden rather than gradual. It is time to put research into the build-up of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere on a better footing.

Description: Stable isotope measurements on molluses from raised marine deposits, and on foraminifera in a piston core, define a series of light isotope events. A major event is14C dated at ca. 10.3 ka and is correlated with a marked isotopic excursion in HU77-021-156. This event is followed by a dramatic rise in diatom and, slightly later, in benthic foraminiferal abundances. Molluses record another light event around 8 ka. Major fluctuations in both δ18O and δ13C around 10.3 ka suggests that the Hudson Strait ice stream may have responded to the Younger Dryas climatic oscillation.