Pelagic tunicates are fascinating for their beauty, remarkable in most cases for their curious and even bizarre life cycles, and often notable for extraordinarily rapid growth. Furthermore, in recent years their major importance in the economy of the sea has been recognized. Although the now outdated encyclopaedic texts of the 1930s dealt with pelagic tunicates, the results of much subsequent physiological and ecological work have only appeared in scattered articles. This book is unique in giving a modern account of the biology of pelagic tunicates, with much new and unpublished information. Different chapters treat such topics as the ecological impact of salp blooms, locomotion by jet propulsion, the affinities of different groups, and the abundance and distribution of each group. Updated classification and identification keys to every pelagic tunicate now known are included. The Biology of Pelagic Tunicates will be useful to all plankton workers, and may perhaps stimulate ecologists, physiologists, and geneticists to begin work on a somewhat neglected group of animals that offer some unusual advantages for different kinds of study.

Estuarine and coastal waters are acknowledged centres for anthropogenic impacts. Superimposed on the complex natural interactions between land, rivers and sea are the myriad consequences of human activity - a spectrum ranging from locally polluting effluents to some of the severest consequences of global climate change. For practitioners, academics and students in the field of coastal science and policy, this timely book examines and exemplifies current and future challenges: from upper estuaries to open coasts and adjacent seas; from tropical to temperate latitudes; from Europe to Australia. This authoritative volume marks the 50th anniversary of the Estuarine and Coastal Sciences Association. Drawing on the expertise of more than 60 specialist contributors, individual chapters address coastal erosion and deposition; open shores to estuaries and deltas; marine plastics; coastal squeeze and habitat loss; tidal freshwaters - saline incursion and estuarine squeeze; restoration management using remote data collection; carbon storage; species distribution and non-natives; shorebirds; Modelling environmental change; physical processes such as sediments and modelling; sea level rise and estuarine tidal dynamics; estuaries as fish nurseries; policy versus reality in coastal conservation; developments in estuarine, coastal and marine management. In addition to providing an overview of current scientific understanding, the material gathered here offers a clear-eyed perspective on what needs to be done to protect these fragile - and vital - ecosystems.

The marine zooplankton is one of the most fascinating and diverse assemblages of animals known to biologists. This student manual provides a photographic guide to representative forms of the major groups from medusae and comb jellies to larval fish and squid. In it, only photographs of live and active organisms appear, giving a unique visual perspective. In this new edition, the authors have revised and updated the taxonomy and morphology so that combined with information on behavior and development, this book creates a vivid and essential reference.

Whether through loss of habitat or cascading community effects, diseases can shape the very nature of the marine environment. Despite their significant impacts, studies of marine diseases have tended to lag behind their terrestrial equivalents, particularly with regards to their ecological effects. However, in recent decades global research focused on marine disease ecology has expanded at an accelerating rate. This is due in part to increases in disease emergence across many taxa, but can also be attributed to a broader realization that the parasites responsible for disease are themselves important members of marine communities. Understanding their ecological relationships with the environment and their hosts is critical to understanding, conserving, and managing natural and exploited populations, communities, and ecosystems. Courses on marine disease ecology are now starting to emerge and this first textbook in the field will be ideally placed to serve them. Marine Disease Ecology is suitable for graduate students and researchers in the fields of marine disease ecology, aquaculture, fisheries, veterinary science, evolution and conservation. It will also be of relevance and use to a broader interdisciplinary audience of government agencies, NGOs, and marine resource managers.

This Second Edition of Plankton is a fully updated introduction to the biology, ecology and identification of plankton and their use in monitoring water quality. It includes expanded, illustrated descriptions of all major groups of freshwater, coastal and marine phytoplankton and zooplankton and a new chapter on teaching science using plankton. Best practice methods for plankton sampling and monitoring programs are presented using case studies, along with explanations of how to analyse and interpret sampling data. Healthy waterways and oceans are essential for our increasingly urbanised world. Yet monitoring water quality in aquatic environments is a challenge, as it varies from hour to hour due to stormwater and currents. Being at the base of the aquatic food web and present in huge numbers, plankton are strongly influenced by changes in environment and provide an indication of water quality integrated over days and weeks. Plankton are the aquatic version of a canary in a coal mine. They are also vital for our existence, providing not only food for fish, seabirds, seals and sharks, but producing oxygen, cycling nutrients, processing pollutants, and removing carbon dioxide from our atmosphere. This new edition: contains a new chapter on Plankton in the Classroom has greatly expanded coverage of coastal and marine phytoplankton explains the role of plankton in aquatic ecosystems and its usefulness as a water quality indicator updates and details best practice in methodology for plankton sampling and monitoring programs brings together widely-scattered information on freshwater and coastal phytoplankton and zooplankton and provides a list of up-to-date references. Plankton is an invaluable reference for teachers and students, environmental managers, ecologists, estuary and catchment management committees, and coastal engineers.

This timely volume provides a comprehensive account of the natural history of the organisms associated with the deep-sea floor and examines their relationship with this inhospitable environment--perhaps the most remote and least accessible location on the planet. The authors begin by describing the physical and chemical nature of the deep-sea floor and the methods used to collect and study its fauna. Then they discuss the ecology of the deep sea by exploring spatial patterns, diversity, biomass, vertical zonation, and large-scale distribution of organisms. Subsequent chapters review current knowledge of feeding, respiration, reproduction, and growth processes in these communities. The unique fauna of hypothermal vents and seeps are considered separately. Finally, there is a pertinent discussion of human exploitation of deep-sea resources and potential use of this environment for waste disposal.

This book explores the sea and its meanings from ancient myths to contemporary geopolitics, from Atlantis to the Mediterranean migrant crisis. Richard Hamblyn traces a cultural and geographical journey from estuary to abyss, beginning with the topographies of the shoreline and ending with the likely futures of our maritime environments. Along the way, the sea becomes a site of work and endurance, of story and song, of language, leisure and longing. By considering the sea as both a physical and a cultural presence, this book shines new light upon it, and its indelible place in the human imagination.

This book provides an introduction to recent analytical and experimental studies of plant growth in the sea. The physiology and ecology of marine plants are, therefore, emphasized at the expense of a more traditional taxonomic or morphological treatment. The physics and chemistry of the marine environment are examined with specific reference to the requirements of marine plants, and much of the book concentrates on those aspects of their physiology which are unique to marine plants, or which help us to understand their ecology. Since over 90% of the species of marine plants are algae, most of the book is devoted to the marine representatives of this group, with examples from all oceans and coasts of the world where detailed work has been done. Phytoplankton and seaweeds are discussed together in chapters on photosynthesis, growth and productivity, and geographical distribution, in order to provide an integrated picture of the biology of marine plants in general. There is, however, a deliberate bias towards the seaweeds in certain chapters (e.g. morphogenesis, rocky shore ecology, economic utilization) since the ecology and physiology of these plants have received less attention in books at this level than has the ecology of phytoplankton. Marine angiosperms are also discussed alongside the autotrophic algae, and the ecological roles of bacteria and fungi in the sea are covered in a separate chapter.