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Introduction To The 10th Marine Law Symposium, Julia Wyman

Roger Williams University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Response And Recovery Of A Mixed Tropical Seagrass Assemblage To Variation In The Frequency And Magnitude Of Light Deprivation. Report Of Theme 5 - Project 5.5.3 Prepared For The Dredging Science Node, John Statton, Kathryn Mcmahon, Rosin Mccallum, Gary Kendrick, Paul Lavery

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

The capacity of seagrasses to cope with episodes of light deprivation from overlying turbid waters may not only depend on the absolute quantity of light they receive during that episode, but also on how the light deprivation varies through time. For example, turbidity and therefore light reduction may be relatively constant over the episode or it may fluctuate depending on the frequency of pulsed turbidity events.

This report presents findings from a controlled mesocosm experiment that aimed to determine the responses of seagrasses to, and recovery from, differences in the pattern of the delivery of light. The study focussed on …

Seagrasses Of The North West Of Western Australia: Biogeography And Considerations For Dredging-Related Research: Report Of Theme 5 - Project 5.1.2 Prepared For The Dredging Science Node, Kathryn Mcmahon, John Statton, Paul Lavery

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

This review was undertaken to identify which seagrass primary producers (species or different functional groups) that collectively cover the bio-geographic range of key primary producers in the northwest of Western Australia are most appropriate for the focus of subsequent research into thresholds and indicators of response to dredging-related pressures (i.e. Theme 5). An assessment framework was developed based on six criteria: biogeographic range; ecological relevance (life-history strategy, habitats, natural dynamics and ecological services); current knowledge on thresholds and bioindicators; likelihood that species are sensitive and resilient to dredging related stressors; extent of improvement in applied knowledge; and likelihood of being …

Current State Of Knowledge Regarding The Effects Of Dredging-Related ‘Pressure’ On Seagrasses: Report Of Theme 5 - Project 5.1.1 Prepared For The Dredging Science Node, Kathryn Mcmahon, Paul Lavery, John Statton, Roisin Mccallum, Udhi Hernawan

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

This review summarises our understanding, from a northwest of Western Australia and global perspective, the pressures seagrasses are exposed to from dredging, their tolerance thresholds and responses to dredging related stressors, and the bioindicators of dredging related stressors. From this information, we also identified gaps in our knowledge and areas where environmental management and monitoring approaches could be improved.

Aims

To determine the levels of stress (light reduction/sediment deposition) that occur under dredging conditions and evaluate the likely effect of these levels of pressure based on the existing seagrass literature, considering the range of variability and environmental quality conditions associated …

Effects Of Dredging-Related Pressures On Critical Ecological Processes For Organisms Other Than Fish Or Coral. Report Of Theme 9 - Project 9.1 Prepared For The Dredging Science Node, Jessie Short, Matthew Fraser, Dianne Mclean, Gary Kendrick, Maria Byrne, Julian Caley, Doug Clarke, Andy Davis, Paul Ertemeijer, Stuart Field, Sam Gustin-Craig, John Huisman, John Keesing, Mick Keough, Paul Lavery, Ray Mansini, Kathryn Mcmahon, Kerrie Mergersen, Michael Rasheed, John Statton, Jim Stoddart, Paul Wu

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

This study reviewed environmental windows for organisms other than corals and fish such as sessile invertebrates, macroalgae and seagrasses. Environmental windows are periods of critical importance to the life history of a marine species, like reproduction and recruitment.

Aims

• To review the scientific literature on the timing and spatial extent of critical ecological processes relevant to tropical WA for marine primary producers and invertebrates (i.e. organisms other than coral and finfish) and the state of knowledge regarding potential effects of dredging on these key ecological processes. The review also had a particular focus on ecological processes in marine primary producers …

Sea Surface Temperature Rises Shift Migration Patterns Due To Ecosystem Changes, Alexia Skrbic, Hesham El-Askary

Student Scholar Symposium Abstracts and Posters

The continuing climate change is negatively impacting ecosystems, specifically oceans which are declining and food webs are being altered by the increase of greenhouse gases. The increase of the carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases is increasing sea surface temperature of the world’s oceans. Certain organisms lower on the food chain like phytoplankton and zooplankton are directly affected by the warming which alters how they process nutrients and their productivity. The limited amount of these primary producers in the oceans and specifically the location they inhabit directly affects all the organisms above them on the food chain. Several marine animals …

Oceans And Ecotones In Mary Shelley’S Maurice, Or The Fisher’S Cot, Colin Carman

Landscapes: the Journal of the International Centre for Landscape and Language

This essay is about oceans in one of Mary Shelley’s non-canonical works, Maurice, or the Fisher’s Cot: A Tale (1820), and the relatedness of humans to their ocean environments; it’s also about Shelley’s representations of those rich and diverse life-forms that populate the edge between sea and land-mass and within what ecologists refer to as an “ecotone.” By characterising the ocean as an ecotone in Maurice, Shelley makes explicit a more eco-conscious way of understanding the nature/culture dichotomy and in terms that directly involve the shifting boundaries between land and sea, saltwater and freshwater, human and animal. This English Romantic …

Western North Pacific Integrated Physical-Biogeochemical Ocean Observation Experiment (Inbox): Part 1.Specifications And Chronology Of The S1-Inbox Floats, Ryuichiro Inoue, Toshio Suga, Shinya Kouketsu, Toshiyuki Kita, Shigeki Hosoda, Taiyo Kobayashi, Kanako Sato, Hiroyuki Nakajima, Takeshi Kawano

Journal of Marine Research

An interdisciplinary project called the Western North Pacific Integrated Physical-Biogeochemical Ocean Observation Experiment (INBOX) has been conducted since 2011. In the oligotrophic subtropics south of the Kuroshio Extension near biogeochemical mooring S1 (30° N, 145° E), 18 floats, each with a dissolved oxygen sensor, have been deployed in a 150 × 150 km square area. With the horizontal (30 km) and temporal (2 days) resolution of the data, we observed an upper ocean structure associated with mesoscale eddies and ocean responses to atmospheric forcing. The data set obtained from the S1-INBOX study was used to elucidate the impacts of physical …

Western North Pacific Integrated Physical-Biogeochemical Ocean Observation Experiment (Inbox): Part 3. Mesoscale Variability Of Dissolved Oxygen Concentrations Observed By Multiple Floats During S1-Inbox, Shinya Kouketsu, Ryuichiro Inoue, Toshio Suga

Journal of Marine Research

As part of the interdisciplinary project S1-INBOX (Western North Pacific Integrated Physical-Biogeochemical Ocean Observation Experiment conducted around the S1 biogeochemical mooring site), we used data from more than 18 floats and a biogeochemical mooring S1 (near 30° N, 145° E) to investigate temporal and spatial changes in the shallow oxygen maximum (SOM) associated with a mesoscale cyclonic eddy. On the northern edge of the cyclonic eddy, patches (linear dimensions of 20–40 km) with relatively high oxygen concentrations were observed around the SOM. The patterns of the oxygen concentrations reflected the fact that changes of the depths of the isopycnal surfaces …

Baroclinic Instability Over Topography: Unstable At Any Wave Number, Joseph Pedlosky

Journal of Marine Research

The instability of an inviscid, baroclinic vertically sheared current of uniform potential vorticity, flowing along a uniform topographic slope, becomes linearly unstable at all wave numbers if the flow is in the direction of propagation of topographic waves. The parameter region of instability in the plane of scaled topographic slope versus wave number then extends to arbitrarily large wave numbers at large slopes. The weakly nonlinear treatment of the problem reveals the existence of a nonlinear enhancement of the instability close to one of the two boundaries of this parametrically narrow unstable region. Because the domain of instability becomes exponentially …

Carbon Cycling In Santa Barbara Basin Sediments: A Modeling Study, David J. Burdige, Tomoko Komada, Cédric Magen, Jeffrey P. Chanton

Journal of Marine Research

The primary input of organic matter to almost all marine sediments comes from deposition at the sediment surface. However, in many continental margin settings, reduced carbon can also be added to sediments from below—for example, from “deep” geologic hydrocarbon reservoirs derived from ancient source rocks or from the decomposition of deeply buried gas hydrate deposits. To examine the impact of these two differing reduced carbon inputs on sediment biogeochemistry, a modified reaction-transport model for anoxic marine sediments is described here and applied to data from sediment cores in Santa Barbara Basin to a depth of 4.6 m. Excellent model fits …

Mechanisms Controlling Vertical Variability Of Subsurface Chlorophyll Maxima In A Mode-Water Eddy, Qian P. Li, Dennis A. Hansell

Journal of Marine Research

An intense subsurface chlorophyll enhancement was found repeatedly within the core of a mode-water eddy during a 2-month period. Two controls on chlorophyll concentrations in this deep chlorophyll maximum (DCM) layer are noted: chlorophyll concentration is controlled by nutrients at low nutrient concentrations and by light when nutrients are saturating. To synthesize these results, a simple one-dimensional nutrient-phytoplankton model is developed by including the effects of phytoplankton self-shading for light attenuation, depth-dependent phytoplankton specific loss, and density-associated nutrient fluctuation in the deep layer. The model is parameterized using eddy data including not only vertical diffusivity, sinking velocity, and chlorophyll-to-carbon ratios, …

Convective Mixing By Internal Waves In The Puerto Rico Trench, Hans Van Haren, Louis Gostiaux

Journal of Marine Research

A 2.4 km long deep-sea mooring was deployed for 14 months in the Puerto Rico Trench, the deepest part of the Atlantic Ocean. Below its top buoyancy package, the mooring line held a 200 m long string of high-resolution temperature sensors and a current meter. Over the instrumented range between 6,004 and 6,204 m, waters are very weakly stratified, with local buoyancy frequency equaling about 1.9 times the semidiurnal tidal frequency. Besides quiescent waters, the detailed observations show regular vertical turbulent overturning associated with periodic warming and driven by internal tidal and inertial waves. During such episodes, the 4-day and …

Methane Dynamics In Santa Barbara Basin (Usa) Sediments As Examined With A Reaction-Transport Model, David J. Burdige, Tomoko Komada, Cédric Magen, Jeffrey P. Chanton

Journal of Marine Research

Here we describe a new reaction-transport model that quantitatively examines δ¹³C profiles of pore-water methane and dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC) (δ¹³C_CH4 and δ¹³C_DIC) in the anoxic sediments of the Santa Barbara Basin (California Borderland region). Best-fit solutions of the model to these data suggest that CO₂ reduction is the predominant form of methanogenesis in these sediments. These solutions also accurately reproduce the isotope depth profiles, including a broad minimum in the δ¹³C_DIC profile and a much sharper (angular) minimum in the δ¹³C_CH4 profile, both …

Western North Pacific Integrated Physical-Biogeochemical Ocean Observation Experiment (Inbox): Part 2. Biogeochemical Responses To Eddies And Typhoons Revealed From The S1 Mooring And Shipboard Measurements, Ryuichiro Inoue, Makio C. Honda, Tetsuichi Fujiki, Kazuhiko Matsumoto, Shinya Kouketsu, Toshio Suga, Toshiro Saino

Journal of Marine Research

An interdisciplinary project called S1-INBOX (Western North Pacific Integrated PhysicalBiogeochemical Ocean Observation Experiment conducted around the S1 biogeochemical mooring site) was carried out during the summer of 2011 in the oligotrophic, subtropical North Pacific Ocean near biogeochemical mooring S1 (30° N, 145° E). Results from the S1 mooring during S1-INBOX revealed a large export flux at a depth of 200 m, a high chlorophyll a concentration in the deep chlorophyll maximum layer, and a high potential photochemical efficiency of photosystem II. These phenomena were associated with vertical uplift of isopycnal surfaces at the edge of a cyclonic eddy and a …

Residual Water Transport In The Marsdiep Tidal Inlet Inferred From Observations And A Numerical Model, Maximiliano G. Sassi, Theo Gerkema, Matias Duran-Matute, Janine J. Nauw

Journal of Marine Research

At tidal inlets, large amounts of water are exchanged with the adjacent sea during the tidal cycle. The residual flows, the net effect of ebb and flood, are generally small compared with the gross flux; they vary in magnitude and sign from one tidal period to the other; and their long-term mean varies from year to year. Here, we focus on the temporal variability of the residual flows in the Marsdiep tidal inlet, which is the western-most inlet of the Wadden Sea, a tidal lagoon along the coasts of the Netherlands, Germany, and Denmark. We compare the transport from a …

The Effect Of Wind Direction On Cross-Shelf Transport On An Initially Stratified Inner Shelf, Rachel M. Horwitz, Steven J. Lentz

Journal of Marine Research

Cross-shelf and along-shelf wind stresses both independently have been shown to drive transport across the inner shelf. We investigate how the circulation and density fields respond to simultaneous cross- and along-shelf wind forcing using a set of model experiments on an initially stratified inner shelf. For all wind directions with a downwelling along-shelf component, the inner shelf is unstratified and the cross-shelf wind dominates transport. For wind directions with an upwelling along-shelf component, the inner shelf can be stratified and the transition from inner to midshelf occurs over a wide swath of shelf. In this transition region, the effects of …

Vorticity Dynamics Near Sharp Topographic Features, Bruno Deremble, William K. Dewar, Eric P. Chassignet

Journal of Marine Research

In ocean models, the interaction with boundaries is often parameterized as it involves small-scale processes that are usually hard to capture in a large-scale model. However, such interactions can play important roles in the model dynamics. For example, the choice of boundary conditions (free-slip vs. no-slip) has a direct impact on the vorticity (enstrophy) budget: with no-slip boundary conditions, vorticity is injected into the system, whereas with free-slip boundary conditions, there should be no vorticity injection as long as the coastline is smooth. However, we show here that at boundary singularities (e.g., corners), vorticity is injected into the domain even …

2016 Conference - "Legal Order In The World's Oceans: Un Convention On The Law Of The Sea": Program, Center For Oceans Law & Policy

Conference on Oceans Law & Policy

Monday, June 27, 2016 to Tuesday, June 28, 2016 | United Nations Headquarters, New York City

The 40th annual COLP conference was organized by the Center for Oceans Law and Policy in cooperation with the Division for Ocean Affairs and the Law of the Sea, and the Office of Legal Affairs of the United Nations.

Purchase Conference Proceedings Volume.

Wind-Driven Flow Over Topography, Michael A. Spall

Journal of Marine Research

The space and time scales over which wind forcing can directly drive flows over regions of closed topographic contours are explored using an idealized numerical model and theory. It is shown that stratification limits the vertical scale of the mean flow but also results in an enhanced recirculation strength in shallow water by distorting the isopycnals in the bottom boundary layer. Time-dependent forcing can drive flows that extend deeper than the mean flow because the initial response is primarily barotropic. This response is limited at low frequencies by baroclinic Rossby wave propagation. It is expected that these wind-driven flows might …

A Composite Vertical Current Spectrum For Strongly And Weakly Stratified Seas And Oceans, Hans Van Haren

Journal of Marine Research

An overall frequency (σ) spectrum φ_w(σ, N, f_h) is composed for vertical current (w) observations from ocean areas with different stratifications represented by large, 100 m scale buoyancy frequency N. The horizontal Coriolis parameter is denoted by f_h. In the open Atlantic Ocean, the relatively strong horizontal layering in density supports the φ_w that is found in semiequilibrium under the degradation of the lowest internal wave mode. This φ_w is not constant with frequency; however, its variance increases between σ = f and its peak near σ = (0.5 …

Species Diversity Patterns Of Marine Plankton And Benthos In Chinese Bays: Baseline Prior To Large-Scale Development, Weiwei Yu, Bin Chen, Paolo F. Ricci, Luoping Zhang, Jianguo Du, Zhiyuan Ma

Journal of Marine Research

More than 28,000 marine species have been recorded in China, which accounts for approximately 10% of all marine organisms in the world and plays a potentially important role in protecting global marine biodiversity. However, knowledge of marine biodiversity patterns in China is limited, and in particular, no comparative diversity analysis has been carried out for Chinese bays. In this study, national-scale species diversity patterns of coastal bays were examined on the basis of investigations for approximately 81 bays throughout the entire Chinese coastline in the 1980s and the early 1990s, revealing the baseline of diversity patterns prior to large-scale development. …

Intertidal Percolation Through Beach Sands As A Source Of 224,223 Ra To Long Island Sound, New York, And Connecticut, United States, Henry Bokuniewicz, J. Kirk Cochran, Jordi Garcia-Orellana, Valenti Rodellas, John Wallace Daniel, Christina Heilbrun

Journal of Marine Research

Along tidal coasts, seawater circulated through the intertidal beach contributes to submarine groundwater discharge (SGD) and its associated geochemical signature. The short-lived radium isotopes, ²²³Ra (half-life = 11.4 d) and ²²⁴Ra (half-life = 3.66 d), were used to quantify this component of SGD in a large estuary, Long Island Sound (LIS), New York, United States. The tide is semidiurnal with a range of approximately 2 m. Concentrations in beach pore waters ranged from 97 to 678 disintegrations per minute (dpm) ²²⁴Ra 100 L^–1, whereas concentrations in open coastal waters ranged from approximately 12 to 69 …

Nitrogen Substrate–Dependent Nitrous Oxide Cycling In Salt Marsh Sediments, Qixing Ji, Andrew R. Babbin, Xuefeng Peng, Jennifer L. Bowen, Bess B. Ward

Journal of Marine Research

Nitrous oxide (N₂O) is important to Earth's climate because it is a strong absorber of radiation and an important ozone depletion agent. Increasing anthropogenic nitrogen input into the marine environment, especially to coastal waters, has led to increasing N₂O emissions. Identifying the nitrogen compounds that serve as substrates for N₂O production in coastal waters reveals important pathways and helps us understand their control by environmental factors. In this study, sediments were collected from a long-term fertilization site in Great Sippewissett Marsh, Falmouth, Massachusetts. The ¹⁵N tracer incubation time course experiments were conducted and …

Distinguishing Turbulent Overturns In High-Sampling-Rate Moored Thermistor String Observations, Hans Van Haren, Louis Gostiaux

Journal of Marine Research

Turbulent overturns are distinguished from salinity-compensated intrusions in high-resolution moored thermistor string observations. The buoyancy frequency N is used to make the time dimensionless, "t*." This results in a primary, visual means to easily compare the duration of overturns with N, the natural frequency that separates internal waves from turbulent overturns. As a secondary means, the shapes of overturns are investigated. Above various sloping topography between 500 and 1,000 m water depth where the buoyancy period varies between ∼1,300 and 2,600 s, vertical overturns of ∼40 m last Δt* =0.2–0.4. This corresponds with the timescale …

Spiciness, Trevor J. Mcdougall, Oliver A. Krzysik

Journal of Marine Research

We define and present algorithms for spiciness, which is an oceanographic variable whose isopycnal variations reflect isopycnal water-mass contrasts in density units. Discussion of spiciness in the oceanographic literature has often concentrated on its supposed orthogonality to isopycnals on the salinity-temperature diagram and how this orthogonal nature means that spiciness is a “passive” thermodynamic variable. Here we show that this “orthogonal” property is devoid of physical meaning. Moreover, it is emphasized that the notion of “orthogonality” on the salinity-temperature diagram does not give rise to a passive thermodynamic variable. Rather, the passive nature of variations of any thermodynamic variable is …

The Influence Of Anoxia And Substrate Availability On N2o Cycling By Denitrification In The Upper Boundary Of The Oxygen Minimum Zone Off Northern Chile, Maribeb Castro-González, Laura Farías

Journal of Marine Research

Strong accumulations of N₂O at oxyclines are some of the most conspicuous features of the world's oceans. However, the origin of these maxima, and the relative contribution of nitrification and denitrification in N₂O cycling, remains unclear. In order to gain insight into the importance of denitrification and factors regulating N₂O cycling at upper oxyclines in the eastern South Pacific, the production and consumption of N₂O by denitrification were measured using a classical acetylene method under induced anoxia with the addition of an electron acceptor (nitrite) and donors (sodium acetate and glucose). The …

Low-Frequency Variability Of The Separated Western Boundary Current In Response To A Seasonal Wind Stress In A 2.5-Layer Model With Outcropping, Jérôme Sirven, Sabine Férvrier, Christophe Herbaut

Journal of Marine Research

The response of the separated western boundary current to a seasonally varying wind stress is studied in a 2.5-layer model where the second layer outcrops. The model is eddy permitting with a resolution of one-sixth of a degree, and the geometry of the basin is idealized. The response is studied for two mean states: the first one is only wind driven, whereas the second one takes into account the existence of a meridional overturning circulation. The separation latitude and the mean path followed by the separated western boundary current are shifted northward of approximately 2° when the overturning circulation is …

The Wall-Layer Dynamics In A Weakly Stratified Tidal Bottom Boundary Layer, I. Lozovatsky, S. U. P. Jinadasa, H. J. S. Fernando, J.-H. Lee, Chang Su Hong

Journal of Marine Research

The application of the classical logarithmic layer model for wall-bounded shear flows to marine bottom boundary layer (BBL) usually leads to an overestimation of the friction velocity u_* due possibly to the influence of form drag, stratification, and rotation of the flow vector. To gain insights on the BBL velocity scaling, acoustic Doppler current profiler (ADCP) measurements taken in the East China Sea were analyzed (a total of 270 sixteen-minute averaged velocity profiles). Single and double log-layer models, a log-wake model, and a modified log-layer (MLL) model that accounts for stratification in the upper part of the BBL (Perlin, …

Maps For The Lost: A Collection Of Short Fiction And Human / Nature Ecotones: Climate Change And The Ecological Imagination: A Critical Essay, Susan Heather Greenhill

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

The thesis comprises a collection of short fiction, Maps for the Lost, and a critical essay, “Human / Nature Ecotones: Climate Change and the Ecological Imagination.” In ecological terms, areas of interaction between adjacent ecosystems are known as ecotones. Sites of relationship between biotic communities, they are charged with fertility and evolutionary possibility. While postcolonial scholarship is concerned with borders as points of cross-cultural contact, ecocritical thought focuses upon the ecotone that occurs at the interface between human and non-human nature.

In their occupation of the liminal zones between human and natural realms, the characters and narratives of Maps …