Clipmarks | Marine biology Clips

New giant clam species discovered

Sat, 30 Aug 2008 15:04:09 GMT

clipped by: tabsey
clipper's remarks: Bring back Johnny Weissmuller and do another Tarzan movie. "Revenge of the Clams" would be appropriate

Clip Source: news.bbc.co.uk

A new species of giant clam has been discovered in the Red Sea.

The fossil record suggests that, about 125,000 years ago, the species Tridacna costata accounted for more than 80% of local giant clams.

The species may now be critically endangered, researchers report in Current Biology journal.

The scientists believe their findings may represent one of the earliest examples of the over-exploitation of marine organisms by humans.

T. costatahas "very peculiar characteristics" that set it apart from two other species of giant clam that are also found in the area.

The Latin word costatus means "ribbed" and T. costata has a disitinctive, zig-zag outline to its shell.

"The new species are mid-sized clams - up to 40cm long and a couple of kilograms heavy," explained co-author Dr Claudio Richter, from the Alfred-Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research, Germany.

The new species has a distant relative, T. gigas, which can grow up to 1.4m long.

nasa tracks whales, sharks and olar bears

Tue, 26 Aug 2008 12:19:25 GMT

clipped by: silvanaraihane

Clip Source: news.nationalgeographic.com

NASA Tool Helps Track Whale Sharks, Polar Bears

Photos of giant whale sharks snapped by vacationing scuba divers and snorkelers are helping scientists track the elusive marine creatures across the oceans.

And the same technique may soon also help researchers track polar bears in Canada, giant Eurasian trout in Mongolia, and ocean sunfish in the Galápagos Islands.

The participatory tracking technique is already lending new insight into the biology of whale sharks, according to Brad Norman, a research scientist from Murdoch University in Perth, Australia.

And the global database of whale shark pictures indicates that some of the giant fish migrate between Mexico, Honduras, and Belize.

"We can use these data to highlight the need for international agreements to protect this threatened species," said Norman, who is a National Geographic Society emerging explorer, as well as the recipient of funding from the Rolex Awards for Enterprise.

Continued on Next Page >>

Whopping Fish Declared New Species

Fri, 22 Aug 2008 01:32:06 GMT

clipped by: pitim

Clip Source: www.livescience.com

A man-sized grouper that trolls the tropical waters of the Eastern Pacific Ocean for octopuses and crabs has been identified as a new fish species after genetic tests.

Called the goliath grouper, the fish can grow to six feet (1.8 meters) in length and weigh a whopping 1,000 pounds (454 kg). Until now, scientists had grouped this species with an identical looking fish (also called the goliath grouper, or Epinephelus itajara) living in the Atlantic Ocean.

"For more than a century, ichthyologists have thought that Pacific and Atlantic goliath grouper were the same species," said lead researcher Matthew Craig of the Hawaii Institute of Marine Biology, "and the argument was settled before the widespread use of genetic techniques."

"Dead Zones" Multiplying Fast, Coastal Water Study Says

Mon, 18 Aug 2008 09:40:37 GMT

clipped by: coonhnd

Clip Source: news.nationalgeographic.com

"Dead Zones" Multiplying Fast, Coastal Water Study Says

"Dead zones" are on the rise, says a new study that identified stark growth in the number of coastal areas where the water has too little oxygen to sustain marine life.

There are now more than 400 known dead zones in coastal waters worldwide, compared to 305 in the 1990s, according to study author Robert Diaz of the Virginia Institute of Marine Science.

Those numbers are up from 162 in the 1980s, 87 in the 1970s, and 49 in the 1960s, Diaz said. In the 1910s, four dead zones had been identified.

Dead Zones

Dead zones occur when excess nutrients—usually nitrogen and phosphorus—from agriculture or the burning of fossil fuels seep into the water system and fertilize blooms of algae along the coast.

As the microscopic plants die and sink to the ocean floor, they feed bacteria, which consume dissolved oxygen from surrounding waters. This limits oxygen availability for bottom-dwelling organisms and the fish that eat them.

Tags: ocean, marine, biology, news

Viruses can catch colds, says study that redefines life itself

Sun, 10 Aug 2008 22:06:46 GMT

clipped by: Silkweaver
clipper's remarks: Prof La Scola and his colleagues were surprised to spot a smaller type of virus attached to the virus-making factory inside infected cells. The new virus - Sputnik - was unable to infect cells by itself but seemed to hijack the larger to achieve its infectious aims.

By regulating the growth and death of plankton, giant viruses - and satellite viruses such as Sputnik - could be a major influence on ocean nutrient cycles and climate.

"These viruses could be major players in global systems," Nature is told by Prof Curtis Suttle, an expert in marine viruses at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver.

Clip Source: www.dailygalaxy.com

viruses can apparently get sick.

Even better, they're made sick by another virus.

Viruses are the ultimate example of KISS - Keep It Simple Stupid. Nothing but a core of genetic material in a protein shell, they may not be able to do anything but replicate (and even then only with a host cell), but they also outnumber us umpty-billion to one.

Their simplicity also makes them hard to kill

Researchers at the Centre Nationale de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) have now discovered a virus, named "Sputnik" for its extreme simplicity, which can hijack the viral factory of another pathogen and insert its own code into the program.

The double-victimised cell now manufactures Sputniks, and copies of the original virus which do manage to be made suffer from damage and imperfections because of this second-super-sub-cellular-sabotage.

Clip Source: www.telegraph.co.uk

the discovery of a giant virus that itself falls ill through infection by another virus seems to suggest they too are alive

Tags: virology, biology, molecular biology

Scientists Catch Live Fish At Record Depth In The Atlantic

Fri, 01 Aug 2008 11:45:48 GMT

clipped by: einbar

Clip Source: www.redorbit.com

Scientists Catch Live Fish At Record Depth In The Atlantic

Scientists say they have captured a live deep-sea fish and three shrimp species at a record depth of 2,300m on the hot vents of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge.

"Pressurized recovery has been around for the past 30 years, but this is the deepest fish-capture under pressure - the previous record was 1,400m. This is also the first time pressurized capture has occurred at a hydrothermal vent," said Dr. Bruce Shillito, marine biologist at the Universite Pierre et Marie Curie, Paris, France.

"At depths of over 1,000m, it is difficult to recover animals alive. Catching with no pressure is as good as catching dead. Fish are the most fragile - even a fisherman with a 100m line will probably reel in a catch whose gas bladder is in its mouth," said Shillito.

The researchers hope to be able to transfer the animals into an experimental lab to study their normal biology.

Blue whale and depth

Tue, 29 Jul 2008 10:00:54 GMT

clipped by: balthazarus

Clip Source: www.nytimes.com

Whales’ Lower-Pitch Sound Has Experts Guessing

The song of the blue whale, one of the eeriest sounds in the ocean, has mysteriously grown deeper.

The calls have been steadily dropping in frequency for seven populations of blue whales around the world over the past 40 years

Scientists cannot explain why blue whales from places as disparate as the northern Pacific and the Southern Ocean, which surrounds Antarctica, would drop the pitch of their songs.

Each blue whale population has a distinct tempo and tone set to its vocals.

the drop might signal a rebound in the population of blue whales since commercial whaling bans began to take effect in the 1970s.

Scientists believe that only male blue whales sing. Female blue whales choose their mates based on size, a selection process that has fostered the species’ gargantuan proportions. And deeper might signal bigger.

Blue whale populations could be growing by 5 percent each year

numbers are hard to come by

because blue whales

are elusive

Tags: marine biology, blue whale

Coral-killing starfish curbed by fishing ban

Sat, 26 Jul 2008 18:51:23 GMT

clipped by: milmufmas

Clip Source: environment.newscientist.com

Coral-killing starfish curbed by fishing ban

The crown-of-thorns starfish, Acanthaster planci, preys on corals in some of the most biodiverse and threatened reefs in the world, dwarfing coral losses from storms and bleaching. The predator is less devastating in "no-take zones" of Australia's Great Barrier Reef, however, where fishing has been banned since 1989 (Current Biology, vol 18, p R598).

A team led by Hugh Sweatman of the Australian Institute of Marine Science in Townsville, Queensland, found that, between 1994 and 2004, there were only about a quarter as many starfish "outbreaks" in no-take zones as in open areas of the reef.

Sweatman suspects that while the protected fish are unlikely to prey on the starfish directly, they may be eating more of the smaller fish that usually prey on small marine invertebrates, which in turn eat more of the juvenile starfish.

Marine worm's jaws say 'cutting-edge new aerospace materials'

Mon, 14 Jul 2008 19:55:41 GMT

clipped by: Silkweaver

Clip Source: www.physorg.com

Researchers in California and New Hampshire report the first detailed characterization of the protein composition of the hard, fang-like jaws of a common marine worm.

Their work could lead to the design of a new class of super-strong, lightweight materials for use as construction and repair materials for spacecraft, airplanes, and other applications.

Researchers remain intrigued by the remarkable hardness of its jaws and long pincers, which rivals that of human teeth and exceed the hardness of many synthetic plastics. But little is known about the exact chemical composition of these structures.

The researchers also characterized the chemical conditions needed for its formation, such as the presence of zinc, which could allow researchers to create synthetic versions of this super-hard, lightweight material.

Tags: biology, bio mimickry, materials

New Coral Reefs Discovered

Sat, 12 Jul 2008 19:38:36 GMT

clipped by: CrazyRedHead

Clip Source: timesonline.typepad.com

A series of coral reefs estimated to cover more than 110 square miles of the sea floor have been discovered in the Southern Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Brazil.

The reefs vary from 9 to 124 miles from the Brazilian coastline and have been found at depths ranging from 60 to 220 feet.

The discovery, announced at the International Coral Reef Symposium held in Fort Lauderdale, in the United States, doubles the known size of the Abrolhos Bank reef system.

Abrolhos Bank is already considered to be one of the most important reefs and it boasts a huge number of marine animals, including some corals, molluscs and fish found nowhere else in the world. Wildlife is even more abundant in the newly discovered areas.

Due to their relative inaccessibility and depth, the newly discovered reefs are teeming with life, in some places harboring 30 times the density of marine life than the known, shallower reefs.”

Tags: ocean, ecology, biology, science

Biologically Inspired Ocean Power Systems

Sun, 06 Jul 2008 01:49:15 GMT

clipped by: wildcat

Clip Source: www.biopowersystems.com

BioPower Systems is commercialising ocean power conversion technologies. Through application of biomimicry, we have adopted nature's mechanisms for survival and energy conversion in the marine environment and have applied these in the development of our proprietary wave and tidal power systems.

Our technologies inherit benefits developed during 3.8 Billion years of evolutionary optimization in nature’s ocean laboratory.The resulting systems move and sway in tune with the forces of the ocean, and naturally streamline when extreme conditions prevail. This leads to lightweight designs and associated low costs.

The inherently simple bioWAVE™ and bioSTREAM™ devices are designed to supply utility-scale grid-connected renewable energy using efficient modular systems. These systems will reside beneath the ocean surface, out of view, and in harmony with the living creatures that inspired their design.

Tags: biology, ocean, energy, biomimicry, wave, tidal, power

Exploited Fish Make Rapid Comeback In World's Largest No-take Marine Reserve Network

Wed, 25 Jun 2008 04:26:28 GMT

clipped by: A53GG4

Clip Source: www.sciencedaily.com

Exploited Fish Make Rapid Comeback In World's Largest No-take Marine Reserve Network

ScienceDaily (June 25, 2008) — No-take marine reserves, in which fishing is completely banned, can lead to very rapid comebacks of the fish species most prized by commercial and recreational fisheries, reveals a new study of Australia's Great Barrier Reef published in the June 24th issue of Current Biology.

The researchers found in most cases that coral trout--the major targets of commercial and recreational hook-and-line fisheries in Australia--bounced back in no-take reserves compared to fished sites in two years or less.

" We were surprised that we documented increases in coral trout density of 31% to 68% in such a short time," said study author Garry Russ of James Cook University in Queensland.

The big surprise was that we detected a consistent, rapid increase in multiple large reserves spread over 1000 km offshore and 700 km inshore.

Tags: science

Living Fossils Have Long- And Short-term Memory Despite Lacking Brain Structures Of Modern Cephalopo

Sun, 01 Jun 2008 19:54:21 GMT

clipped by: Silkweaver
clipper's remarks: Perhaps it is not entirely necessary to have a brain in order to have a mind

Clip Source: www.sciencedaily.com

Robyn Crook from the City University of New York reports that Nautilus, the ancient living ancestors of modern cephalopods, have both long and short-term memory, despite lacking the brain structures that modern cephalopods evolved for long-term memory.

Nautiloids are the sole surviving family of externally-shelled cephalopods that thrived in the tropical oceans 450--150 million years ago.

Training Nautilus pompilus to associate the smell of food with a blue light, the cephalopods eventually learned to respond to a flash of blue light by extending their tentacles. Then the scientists tested the cephalopods memories with a flash of light 3min, 30min, 1h, 6h, 12h and 24h after training.

Amazingly, Nautilus remembered their training for up to an hour before the memory was lost, but then the memory returned 6h later, lasting up to 24h. Nautilus has both short and long term memory, just like modern cephalopods, despite lacking the same brain structures.

Tags: biology, marine life, evolution of brain

Super size sea monsters

Fri, 09 May 2008 04:56:49 GMT

clipped by: hitchhiker08
clipper's remarks: Wonders never cease...

Clip Source: abcnews.go.com

SUPERSIZE SEA MONSTERS

Two Thai fishermen show off a 646-pound giant catfish they caught in the Mekong River in the Chiang Khong district of Chiang Rai Province in northern Thailand in mid-May 2005.

Clip Source: abcnews.go.com

At the time of this 2007 photo, Japanese scientists had captured what may be the first images of a live giant squid.

Clip Source: abcnews.go.com

A Cambodian fisherman holds a giant stingray fish on the Mekong River near the Cambodian/Vietnam border on Dec. 10, 2002.

Clip Source: abcnews.go.com

Two giant ''echizen'' jellyfish are seen swimming in the Sea of Japan five meters below the surface off the Town of Echizen, Fukui Prefecture.

Clip Source: abcnews.go.com

The 880-pound ocean sunfish, shown in this undated photo

returned to sea on Wednesday, Nov. 4, 1998. Aquarium spokesman Ken Peterson said that the sunfish had outgrown its exhibit.

Clip Source: abcnews.go.com

Giant Pacific Octopus is considered very intelligent for an invertebrate.

Clip Source: abcnews.go.com

Antarctic explorers hold a giant Macroptychaster sea star (starfish).

Clip Source: abcnews.go.com

giant Japanese Spider crab is the world's largest marine crab

weigh up to 20 kgs.

Tags: sea, marine biology, fish, invertebrate

Seal Pu Hunt researche/observer speakds out

Wed, 07 May 2008 16:09:30 GMT

clipped by: papananook
clipper's remarks: Interesting perspective...

Clip Source: www.ifaw.org

A Decade of Devotion:
Meet Sheryl Fink, Senior Research & Projects Specialist

Sheryl is a Senior Research and Projects Specialist working out of IFAW’s Guelph (Canada) office. She has always loved animals, and studied Wildlife Biology at the University of Guelph in Canada. Sheryl began working for the International Marine Mammal Association in 1998 and has worked for IFAW since 2000.

What is the worst part of your job?
The worst part is when March rolls around and the seal hunt is announced. I’ve been working on this campaign for quite a few years, and when the hunt keeps happening every year sometimes you can feel like you aren’t really getting anywhere. We have to keep reminding ourselves that even if the hunt hasn’t stopped altogether, we are still having an impact and that some progress has been made. I do know that if IFAW were not speaking out against this hunt, there would be many more seals killed, and far fewer regulations on sealing.