The continental shelf seas have an importance out of proportion to the reatively small fraction of the area of the global ocean which they occupy. These shallow seas play and important role as the high energy boundary zones of the deep ocean where much of the ocean's tidal and wave energies are dissipated. The North Sea is an archetypal representative of such seas. This text brings the principal results from the North Sea Project which were presented at a discussion meeting organized by the Royal Society. It argues that we should understand and predict the processes of the North Sea in order to achieve a degree of rational management in the future, as environmental threats increase.

The continental shelf seas have an importance which is out of proportion to the rela tively small fraction of the area of the global ocean which they occupy. These shallow seas play an important role as the high energy boundary zones of the deep ocean where much of the ocean's tidal and wave energies are dissipated. They are highly productive biologically and are responsible for most of the world's fishery production. In many cases, they are also sources of economically important resources, notably hydrocarbons and they are frequently important as thorough fares for merchant shipping. Because they are the regions of the ocean closest to our centres of population and industrial activity, they have been the first to feel the impact of the increasing pressures imposed by large scale waste disposal into the ocean. The North Sea is an archetypal representative of such seas: we need to be able to understand its processes and predict them if we are to achieve a degree of rational management in the future, as the environmental threats increase. The understanding required extends through a wide range of processes that operate in the shelf seas from the fundamental physics to the chemistry and biology of the water column and the seabed sediments. These processes, and the interactions between them, cut across the traditional discipline boundaries within marine science and require a substantial inter disciplinary effort for their effective study.

Estuaries is a comprehensive introductory text emphasizing the physical processes involved in the mixing of sea and river water and the transport of fine sediments within the complex estuarine topographic context. The theoretical and mathematical formulation of these processes are treated at a fairly elementary level, and are used to develop a foundation for more extensive study. The second edition retains the classical approaches to the tidally averaged circulation and mixing conditions but broadens them to consider recent advances in the understanding of processes occurring within the tide. The scope has also been widened to include more detail on the morphology of estuaries and their development, the fluxes of suspended fine sediments, and the generation and maintenance of turbidity maximum. The book provides an excellent introduction for research students in oceanography, environmental science, geography, geology, and water and coastal engineering. It will also be useful as a reference book for those working in water quality, morphological modelling and estuarine environmental management.