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Books > Earth & environment > Earth sciences > The hydrosphere > Oceanography (seas)
How do you dig up a 13,000 year-old footprint? Why do kelp forests need sea otters? How do you measure a shrinking glacier from an airplane? What is a 'zombie urchin'? Heart of the Coast brings these questions to life in a deep exploration of the beauty, mystery and biodiversity of the Pacific coast. Join Hakai Institute researchers in the field-archaeologists, oceanographers, marine biologists and beyond-as they journey from the ice fields of Klinaklini Glacier to the dazzling undersea reefs of a place called Crazy Town. British Columbia's Central Coast is a rich landscape called "a biologist's dream" and "the Amazon of the north." Since launching its Calvert Island ecological observatory there in 2009, the Hakai Institute has become a renowned centre of science and exploration. Collaborations with the Smithsonian Institution, the Monterey Bay Aquarium, and several First Nations on the BC coast--along with a wide array of scientists hailing from other agencies and universities across North America-have uncovered new species, advanced our knowledge of marine food webs, and helped track the effects of climate change on watersheds and coastal ecosystems. Stunning photography illuminates the institute's journey of discovery over the past decade. This unforgettable book will inspire you with wonder and awe for the natural world, but be careful-you may learn something along the way.
The ocean has absorbed a significant portion of all human-made carbon dioxide emissions. This benefits human society by moderating the rate of climate change, but also causes unprecedented changes to ocean chemistry. Carbon dioxide taken up by the ocean decreases the pH of the water and leads to a suite of chemical changes collectively known as ocean acidification. The long term consequences of ocean acidification are not known, but are expected to result in changes to many ecosystems and the services they provide to society. Ocean Acidification: A National Strategy to Meet the Challenges of a Changing Ocean reviews the current state of knowledge, explores gaps in understanding, and identifies several key findings. Like climate change, ocean acidification is a growing global problem that will intensify with continued CO2 emissions and has the potential to change marine ecosystems and affect benefits to society. The federal government has taken positive initial steps by developing a national ocean acidification program, but more information is needed to fully understand and address the threat that ocean acidification may pose to marine ecosystems and the services they provide. In addition, a global observation network of chemical and biological sensors is needed to monitor changes in ocean conditions attributable to acidification. Table of Contents Front Matter Summary 1 Introduction 2 Effects of Ocean Acidification on the Chemistry of Seawater 3 Effects of Ocean Acidification on the Physiology ofMarine Organisms 4 Effects of Ocean Acidification on Marine Ecosystems 5 Socioeconomic Concerns 6 A National Ocean Acidification Program References Appendix A: Committee and Staff Biographies Appendix B: Acronyms Appendix C: The Effect of Ocean Acidification on Calcification in Calcifying Algae, Corals,and Carbonate-dominated Systems Appendix D: Summary of Research Recommendations from Community-based References
This IAS Special Publication #27 contains 17 of the papers
presented at the IAS International Workshop on Reefs and Carbonate
platforms in the Pacific and Indian oceans held in Sydney (July
1995). This is the first book to summarize the current state of
knowledge about reefs and carbonate platforms in these oceans,
where there is a great diversity of carbonate systems in various
tectonic settings. Papers concern both processes operating in reefs
and carbonate platforms and case histories (platform and oceanic
reef case histories). Case histories range from the Lower
Cretaceous to modern reefs and most fossil carbonate platforms
concern outcomes from recent ODP legs in the Pacific. The book
covers a broad spectrum of disciplines related to carbonate
geology: sedimentology, geochemistry, geophysics, reef ecology and
modeling. If you are a member of the International Association of Sedimentologists, for purchasing details, please see: http: //www.iasnet.org/publications/details.asp?code=SP25
This title articulates a valuable new approach to managing marine ecosystems. Conventional management approaches cannot meet the challenges faced by ocean and coastal ecosystems today. Consequently, national and international bodies have called for a shift toward more comprehensive ecosystem-based marine management. Synthesizing a vast amount of current knowledge, "Ecosystem-Based Management for the Oceans" is a comprehensive guide to utilizing this promising new approach. At its core, ecosystem-based management (EBM) is about acknowledging connections. Instead of focusing on the impacts of single activities on the delivery of individual ecosystem services, EBM focuses on the array of services that we receive from marine systems, the interactive and cumulative effects of multiple human activities on these coupled ecological and social systems, and the importance of working towards common goals across sectors. "Ecosystem-Based Management for the Oceans" provides a conceptual framework for students and professionals who want to understand and utilize this powerful approach. And it employs case studies that draw on the experiences of EBM practitioners to demonstrate how EBM principles can be applied to real-world problems. The book emphasizes the importance of understanding the factors that contribute to social and ecological resilience - the extent to which a system can maintain its structure, function, and identity in the face of disturbance. Utilizing the resilience framework, professionals can better predict how systems will respond to a variety of disturbances, as well as to a range of management alternatives. "Ecosystem-Based Management for the Oceans" presents the latest science of resilience, while it provides tools for the design and implementation of responsive EBM solutions.
The ocean is opaque to electromagnetic radiation and transparent to low frequency sound, so acoustical methodologies are an important tool for sensing the undersea world. Stochastic sound-speed fluctuations in the ocean, such as those caused by internal waves, result in a progressive randomisation of acoustic signals as they traverse the ocean environment. This signal randomisation imposes a limit to the effectiveness of ocean acoustic remote sensing, navigation and communication. Sound Propagation through the Stochastic Ocean provides a comprehensive treatment of developments in the field of statistical ocean acoustics over the last 35 years. This will be of fundamental interest to oceanographers, marine biologists, geophysicists, engineers, applied mathematicians, and physicists. Key discoveries in topics such as internal waves, ray chaos, Feynman path integrals, and mode transport theory are addressed with illustrations from ocean observations. The topics are presented at an approachable level for advanced students and seasoned researchers alike.
Lynne Cox has set open water swimming records across the world,
and now she has focused her decades-long experience and expertise
into this definitive guide to swimming. Cox methodically addresses
what is needed to succeed at and enjoy open water swimming,
including choosing the right bathing suit and sunscreen; surviving
in dangerous weather conditions, currents, and waves; confronting
various marine organisms; treating ailments, such as being stung or
bitten, and much more. Cox calls upon Navy SEAL training materials
and instructors' knowledge of open water swimming and safety
procedures to guide her research. In addition, first-hand anecdotes
from SEAL specialists and stories of Cox's own experiences serve as
both warnings and proper practices to adopt.
This open access book provides a cross-sectoral, multi-scale assessment of marine litter in Africa with a focus on plastics. From distribution, to impacts on environmental and human health, this book looks at what is known scientifically. It includes a policy analysis of the instruments that currently exist, and what is needed to help Africa tackle marine litter-including local and transboundary sources. Across 5 chapters, experts from Africa and beyond have put together a summary of the scientific knowledge currently known about marine litter in Africa. The context of the African continent and future projections form a backdrop on which the scientific knowledge is built. This scientific knowledge incorporates quantities, distributions, and pathways of litter into the marine environment, highlighting where the impacts of marine litter are most felt in Africa. These impacts have widespread effects, with ecological, social, economic, and human health repercussions. While containing detailed scientific information, this book provides a sound knowledge base for policymakers, NGOs and the broader public.
Estuaries are complex and fascinating natural environments, where constantly changing water depths generate rapidly reversing currents and transport vast quantities of salt, heat, and sediment on a daily basis. Estuaries: Monitoring and Modeling the Physical System examines these processes, offering extensive information about the geological evolution of estuaries, and details of bathymetry, tides, currents, salt and heat, and suspended sediment. By carefully building a working computer model which accurately emulates the complexities inherent in estuaries, students learn quickly to model the tides and currents, and then to build and test salinity, temperature, and suspended sediment modules. The book is strongly supported by a website at www.blackwellpublishing.com/hardisty which includes: Regularly updated Dynamic Internet References Excel routines for individual formulae and diagrams Full coding for the estuarine model THE ANALYSIS OF TIDAL STREAM POWER - For Jack Hardisty's new book and the accompanying website please click here: http://eu.wiley.com/WileyCDA/WileyTitle/productCd-047072451X.html
Since the mid-nineteenth century, agricultural development and fisheries management in northern Japan have been profoundly shaped by how people within and beyond Japan have compared Hokkaido's landscapes to those of other places, as part of efforts to make the new Japanese nation-state more legibly "modern." In doing so, they engaged in non-conforming modes of thinking that reached out to diverse places, including the American West and southern Chile. Today, the comparisons made by Hokkaido fishing industry professionals, scientists, and Ainu indigenous groups between the island's forests, fields, and waters and those of other places around the world continue to dramatically affect the region's approaches to environmental management and its physical landscapes. In this far-ranging ethnography, Heather Anne Swanson shows how this traffic in ideas shapes the course of Hokkaido's development, its fish, and the lives of people on and beyond the island while structuring trade dynamics, political economy, and multispecies relations in watersheds around the globe.
Mass Transport, Gravity Flows, and Bottom Currents: Downslope and Alongslope Processes and Deposits focuses solely on important downslope and alongslope processes. The book provides clear definitions and characteristics based on soil mechanics, fluid mechanics and sediment concentration by volume. It addresses Slides, Slumps, and Debris Flows, Grain Flows, Liquefied/Fluidized Flows, and Turbidity Currents, Density plumes, Hyperpycnal Flows, the Triggering Mechanisms of Downslope Processes, Bottom Currents, and Soft-Sediment Deformation Structures. The mechanics of each process are described in detail and used to provide empirically-driven categories to help recognize these deposits it the rock record. Case studies clearly illustrate of the problems inherent in recognizing these processes in the rock record, and potential solutions are provided alongside future avenues of research. An appendix also provides step-by-step guidance in describing and interpreting sediments.
Chemical Oceanography: Element Fluxes in the Sea focuses on the use of chemical distributions to understand mechanisms of physical, chemical, biological, and geological processes in the ocean. After an introduction describing observed chemical concentrations, chapters focus on using chemical tracers to determine fluxes on a variety of time scales. Long-term chemical cycles are dominated by exchanges between seawater and land, sediments, and underwater volcanoes. Biological and ocean mixing processes dominate internal chemical cycles that respond to changes on hundred- to thousand-year time scales. Stable and radioactive isotopes trace the fluxes of nutrients and carbon to quantify the rates and mechanisms of chemical cycles. Anthropogenic influences - which have grown to be of the same magnitude as some natural cycles - are a specific focus throughout the book. Discussion boxes and quantitative problems help instructors to deepen student learning. Appendices enhance the book's utility as a reference text for students and researchers.
Sediments, ice, corals, and trees are just some of the natural storehouses of information that help tell the complicated history of Earth?s climate. Paleoclimate researchers use these ?proxies,? in combination with numerical models, to gain understanding of the magnitudes, rates, and drivers of past climate variability with the goal of informing understanding of current and future change in Earth?s climate system. The Paleo Perspectives on Climate Change (P2C2) program of the National Science Foundation (NSF) has advanced paleoclimate research through proxy development, data-model comparisons, and synthesis work, and has facilitated interdisciplinary collaboration that has contributed to the growth of the field. This new publication highlights discussions at a June 2021 workshop that focused on identifying potential future paleoclimate research directions to further advance understanding of past climate and better inform the public and decision makers about the expected future. Table of Contents Front Matter Overview Introduction Understanding Past Climate Forcings and Sensitivity Glacial, Ocean, and Land Processes and Feedbacks Resolving Regional Climate Change: Advancing and Synthesizing Knowledge How the Paleoclimate Community Can Better Engage on BAJEDI Issues Closing Thoughts References Appendix A: Statement of Task Appendix B: Biographical Sketches of Planning Committee Members Appendix C: Workshop Agenda
Human health and well-being are tied to the vitality of the global ocean and coastal systems on which so many live and rely. We engage with these extraordinary environments to enhance both our health and our well-being. But, we need to recognize that introducing contaminants and otherwise altering these ocean systems can harm human health and well-being in significant and substantial ways. These are complex, challenging, and critically important themes. How the human relationship to the oceans evolves in coming decades may be one of the most important connections in understanding our personal and social well-being. Yet, our understanding of this relationship is far too limited. This remarkable volume brings experts from diverse disciplines and builds a workable understanding of breadth and depth of the processes both social and environmental that will help us to limit future costs and enhance the benefits of sustainable marine systems. In particular, the authors have developed a shared view that the global coastal environment is under threat through intensified natural resource utilization, as well as changes to global climate and other environmental systems. All these changes contribute individually, but more importantly cumulatively, to higher risks for public health and to the global burden of disease. This pioneering book will be of value to advanced undergraduate and postgraduate students taking courses in public health, environmental, economic, and policy fields. Additionally, the treatment of these complex systems is of essential value to the policy community responsible for these questions and to the broader audience for whom these issues are more directly connected to their own health and well-being. "The seas across this planet and their effects on human society and its destiny are a fascinating subject for analysis and insights derived from intellectual inquiry. This diverse and complex subject necessarily requires a blending of knowledge from different disciplines, which the authors of this volume have achieved with remarkable success." "The following pages in this volume are written in a lucid and very readable style, and provide a wealth of knowledge and insightful analysis, which is a rare amalgam of multi-disciplinary perspectives and unique lines of intellectual inquiry. It is valuable to get a volume such as this, which appeals as much to a non-specialist reader as it does to those who are specialists in the diverse but interconnected subjects covered in this volume." (From the "Foreword" written by, R K Pachauri, Director General, TERI and Chairman, IPCC)
Oceans 2020 presents a comprehensive assessment of the most important science and societal issues that are likely to arise in marine science & ocean management in the next twenty years. Sponsored by the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC), the Scientific Committeeon Oceanic Research (SCOR), and the Scientific Committee on Problems of the Environment (SCOPE), the book brings together the world's leading ocean scientists and researchers to analyze the state of marine science and technology, identify key scientific issues for sustainable development, and evaluate the capability of scientists, governments, and private-sector stakeholders to respond to those issues. Topics include: basic ocean sciences, pressures on the coastal zone, climate change and the ocean, fisheries and fishery science in their search for sustainability, offshore industries including oil drilling, carbon sequestration, and, manganese nodule mining, marine information for shipping and defense Also included are chapters on cross-cutting issues including operational oceanography, ocean instrumentation and technology, developing frameworks for cooperation, and capacity building in developing nations. In addition,the book offers an introductory overview and a "Vision to 2020" that outlines a path to rational ocean governance. In each chapter, contributors give a brief but comprehensive overview of the subject and then consider what has been achieved in recent years, define the problems, outline solutions, and set forth recommendations on the needs for and directions of ocean science in support of sustainable development for the next twenty years. Oceans 2020 suggests what can be done about major marine environmental issues through the better development and application of marine science and technology, focusing on the issues that are most closely related to human and sustainable development. It will help guide countries in developing their marine science and technology strategies and priorities and is an essential source of information for policymakers, government officials, resource managers, scientists, the media, and all those concerned with the current and future health of the oceans.
From vividly colored underwater photographs of Australia's Great Barrier Reef to life-size dioramas re-creating coral reefs and the bounty of life they sustained, the work of early twentieth-century explorers and photographers fed the public's fascination with reefs. In the 1920s John Ernest Williamson in the Bahamas and Frank Hurley in Australia produced mass-circulated and often highly staged photographs and films that cast corals as industrious, colonizing creatures, and the undersea as a virgin, unexplored, and fantastical territory. In Coral Empire Ann Elias traces the visual and social history of Williamson and Hurley and how their modern media spectacles yoked the tropics and coral reefs to colonialism, racism, and the human domination of nature. Using the labor and knowledge of indigenous peoples while exoticizing and racializing them as inferior Others, Williamson and Hurley sustained colonial fantasies about people of color and the environment as endless resources to be plundered. As Elias demonstrates, their reckless treatment of the sea prefigured attitudes that caused the environmental crises that the oceans and reefs now face.
Despite our reliance on the ocean and its resources, it remains a frontier for scientific exploration and discovery. Seafloor observatories?unmanned systems of instruments, sensors, and command modules?will have power and communication capabilities to provide support for spatially distributed sensing systems and mobile platforms. Illuminating the Hidden Planet is a voyage to the bottom of the sea, advancing oceanographic science further through long time-series measurements, to discover the mysteries of the deep that have, until now, avoided scientific opportunity.
The sea covers seven-tenths of the Earth, but we have mapped only a small percentage of it. The sea contains millions of species of animals and plants, but we have identified only a few thousand of them. The sea controls our planet's climate, but we do not really understand how. The sea is still the frontier, and yet it seems so familiar that we sometimes forget how little we know about it. Just as we are poised on the verge of exploiting the sea on an unprecedented scale mining it, fertilizing it, fishing it out this book reminds us of how much we have yet to learn. More than that, it chronicles the knowledge explosion that has transformed our view of the sea in just the past few decades, and made it a far more interesting and accessible place. From the Big Bang to that far-off future time, two billion years from now, when our planet will be a waterless rock; from the lush crowds of life at seafloor hot springs to the invisible, jewel-like plants that float at the sea surface; from the restless shifting of the tectonic plates to the majestic sweep of the ocean currents, Kunzig's clear and lyrical prose transports us to the ends of the Earth. Originally published in hardcover as The Restless Sea. "Robert Kunzig is a creator of what oceanographer Harry Hess once referred to as 'geopoetry.' He covers vast tracts of time and space and makes his subjects electrifying." Richard Ellis, The Times London] "The Restless Sea immediately surfaces at the top of the list of journalistic treatments of oceanography. . . .The book opened my eyes to numerous wonders." Richard Strickland, American Scientist "When you head for the coast this summer, leave that trashy beach novel at home. Instead, pack Robert Kunzig's book. Because just beyond your rental cottage lies the restless sea, where three-mile-tall mountain ranges criss-cross the ocean floor, and deep trenches harbor mysterious creatures. . . . The book is easy to read, and will bring you up to date on the startling discoveries oceanographers have made during the past few decades." Phillip Manning, The News and Observer Raleigh, North Carolina] ] "Anyone who loves the sea should read this book." Sebastian Junger"
A gripping tale of exploration aboard H.M.S. Challenger, an expedition that laid the foundations for modern oceanography From late 1872 to 1876, H.M.S. Challenger explored the world's oceans. Conducting deep sea soundings, dredging the ocean floor, recording temperatures, observing weather, and collecting biological samples, the expedition laid the foundations for modern oceanography. Following the ship's naturalists and their discoveries, earth scientist Doug Macdougall engagingly tells a story of Victorian-era adventure and ties these early explorations to the growth of modern scientific fields. In this lively story of discovery, hardship, and humor, Macdougall examines the work of the expedition's scientists, especially the naturalist Henry Moseley, who rigorously categorized the flora and fauna of the islands the ship visited, and the legacy of John Murray, considered the father of modern oceanography. Macdougall explores not just the expedition itself but also the iconic place that H.M.S. Challenger has achieved in the annals of ocean exploration and science.
This textbook is a self-contained introduction to tides that will be useful for courses on tides in oceans and coastal seas at an advanced undergraduate and postgraduate level, and will also serve as the go-to book for researchers and coastal engineers needing information about tides. The material covered includes: a derivation of the tide-generating potential; a systematic overview of the main lunar periodicities; an intuitive explanation of the origin of the main tidal constituents; basic wave models for tidal propagation (e.g. Kelvin waves, the Taylor problem); shallow-water constituents; co-oscillation and resonance; frictional and radiation damping; the vertical structure of tidal currents; and a separate chapter on internal tides, which deals with ocean stratification, propagation of internal tides (vertical modes and characteristics) and their generation. Exercises are provided in each chapter.
A comprehensive introduction to the most commonly used statistical methods relevant in atmospheric, oceanic and climate sciences. Each method is described step-by-step using plain language, and illustrated with concrete examples, with relevant statistical and scientific concepts explained as needed. Particular attention is paid to nuances and pitfalls, with sufficient detail to enable the reader to write relevant code. Topics covered include hypothesis testing, time series analysis, linear regression, data assimilation, extreme value analysis, Principal Component Analysis, Canonical Correlation Analysis, Predictable Component Analysis, and Covariance Discriminant Analysis. The specific statistical challenges that arise in climate applications are also discussed, including model selection problems associated with Canonical Correlation Analysis, Predictable Component Analysis, and Covariance Discriminant Analysis. Requiring no previous background in statistics, this is a highly accessible textbook and reference for students and early-career researchers in the climate sciences.
The tide is the greatest synchronised movement of matter on our planet. Every drop of seawater takes part in tidal motion, driven by the gravitational pull of the moon and sun. At the coast, we see the tide as a twice-daily rise and fall of sea level that moves the edge of the sea up and down a beach or cliff-face. In some places, the tide is small but at others it can rise in a few hours by the height of a three storey building; it then has to be treated with great respect by those who live and work by the sea. In this Very Short Introduction David George Bowers and Emyr Martyn Roberts explore what we know about the tides. Blending clear explanations of well known tidal phenomena with recent insights in the deep ocean and coastal seas, Bowers and Roberts use examples from around the world, to tell the story of the tide, considering its nature and causes, its observation and prediction, and unusual tides and their relevance. They explore why tides have attracted the attention of some of the world's greatest scientists, from the initial challenge of explaining why there are two tides a day when the moon and sun pass overhead just once; a problem that was solved by Isaac Newton. In the 19th century, scientists unravelled the rhythms of the tide; good tidal predictions in the form of tide tables were then possible. The predictions were made on beautiful tide predicting machines constructed of brass and mahogany, some of which can still be seen in maritime museums. In the 20th century, the importance of tides as mixers of sea water became evident. As Bowers and Roberts explore, tidal mixing of the ocean is essential for maintaining its deep circulation, a key part of the climate-control system of our planet. In inshore waters, tidal mixing enhances biological productivity, influences sea temperature and turbidity and creates dramatic features such as maelstroms and tidal bores. In the 21st century, space probes are examining the effects of tidal processes on the moons of Jupiter and Saturn and the possibility of tidally-heated liquid oceans with their own ecosystems. Looking to the cutting edge of tidal research, Bowers and Roberts also consider how we can study the role of the tide in the geological and biological evolution of our own planet with innovative computer models. ABOUT THE SERIES: The Very Short Introductions series from Oxford University Press contains hundreds of titles in almost every subject area. These pocket-sized books are the perfect way to get ahead in a new subject quickly. Our expert authors combine facts, analysis, perspective, new ideas, and enthusiasm to make interesting and challenging topics highly readable.
Winner of the Sustainability Science Award 2020, Ecological Society of America Winner of the PROSE Award (Biological Sciences category) 2020, Association of American PublishersThere is a growing crisis in our oceans: mysterious outbreaks of infectious disease are on the rise. Marine epidemics can cause mass die-offs of wildlife from the bottom to the top of food chains, impacting the health of ocean ecosystems as well as lives on land. Portending global environmental disaster, ocean outbreaks are fueled by warming seas, sewage dumping, unregulated aquaculture, and drifting plastic. Ocean Outbreak follows renowned scientist Drew Harvell and her colleagues into the field as they investigate how four iconic marine animals-corals, abalone, salmon, and starfish-have been devastated by disease. Based on over twenty years of research, this firsthand account of the sometimes gradual, sometimes exploding impact of disease on our ocean's biodiversity ends with solutions and a call to action. Only through policy changes and the implementation of innovative solutions from nature can we reduce major outbreaks, save some ocean ecosystems, and protect our fragile environment. |
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