Previous research suggests that this southward shift in the jet stream has contributed to changes in ocean circulation patterns and precipitation patterns in the Southern hemisphere both
and other possible mechanisms for how greenhouse gases and ozone influence the jet stream as well as Antarctic sea ice.
While earlier studies on vegetation change through this period relied on the analysis of individual sites throughout the Rift valley--offering narrow snapshots--Feakins took a look at the whole picture by using a sediment core taken in the Gulf of Aden where winds funnel
and salt marshes and sea grass beds being decimated. We need to figure this stuff out quickly.
Using an atmosphere-ocean coupled climate model that simulates realistically both past and present-day climate conditions the scientists found that for every degree rise in global temperature the global rainfall rate
Our climate model simulations show that this difference results from different sea surface temperature patterns.
When warming is increased due to greenhouse gases the gradient of sea surface temperature (SST) across the tropical Pacific weakens
while the eastern Pacific remains cool from the usual ocean upwelling. While during past global warming from solar heating the steeper tropical east-west SST pattern has won out we suggest that with future warming from greenhouse gases the weaker gradient
and through clever engineering we've taken its capabilities a step further says lead author Mathias Kolle a postdoctoral fellow at the Harvard School of engineering and Applied sciences (SEAS).
Professor of Materials Science at Harvard SEAS and Kolle's adviser. Aizenberg is also Director of the Kavli Institute for Bionano Science and Technology at Harvard and a Core Faculty member at the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard.
which carbon is exchanged among the atmosphere the ocean the biosphere and Earth's crust. Fewer trees mean not only a weakening of the forest's ability to absorb carbon
and drawing in more water vapor from the Gulf of mexico as well as the Central Valley. When the additional waves of moisture bump into developing monsoons Famiglietti said it's like throwing fuel on a fire.
and the water line retreats farther and farther back into the marsh. The unchecked multitudes of purple marsh crabs have taken a visible toll on the developed areas of the Cape.
Ocean warming also appears to have stabilised somewhat despite the fact that CO2 emissions and other anthropogenic factors thought to contribute to global warming are still on the rise.
They also entered measurements of temperatures taken in the air on ground and in the oceans. The researchers used a single climate model that repeated calculations millions of times in order to form a basis for statistical analysis.
and ocean for the period ending in 2000 they found that climate sensitivity to a doubling of atmospheric CO2 concentration will most likely be 3. 7°C
because the oceans delay the effect by several decades. Natural changes also a major factorthe figure of 1. 9°C as a prediction of global warming from a doubling of atmospheric CO2 concentration is an average.
And as sea levels rise with climate change understanding how plants particularly crops react to salt might allow us to develop plant varieties that can grow in the saltier soils that will likely occur in coastal zones.
what did the warming do to global sea levels? --as we face global warming in the future the answer to these questions is becoming very important.
when the oceans were four to eight meters higher than today the ice sheet in northwest Greenland was only a few hundred meters lower than the current level
and running out to sea in warm climate periods like the Eemianas we thought explains Dorthe Dahl-Jensen
if Greenland's ice did not disappear during the Eemian then Antarctica must be responsible for a significant portion of the 4-8 meter rise in sea levels that we know occurred during the Eemian.
The researchers attribute the 2005 Amazonian drought to the long-term warming of tropical Atlantic sea surface temperatures.
Intense rainstorms and floods will become more common and existing risks to the Great lakes will be exacerbated.
Impacts are already being felt in the forests in agriculture in the Great lakes and in our urban centers said Scavia director of the Graham Sustainability Institute and special counsel to the U-M president on sustainability issues.
Climate change will likely worsen a host of existing problems in the Great lakes including changes in the range and distribution of important commercial and recreational fish species increases in invasive species declining beach health and more frequent harmful
However declines in ice cover on the Great lakes may lengthen the commercial shipping season. In agriculture longer growing seasons and rising carbon dioxide levels are likely to increase the yields of some Midwest crops over the next few decades according to the report though those gains will be increasingly offset by the more frequent occurrence of heat waves droughts and floods.
Focusing on 10 Midwest states Great lakes Bioenergy researchers from MSU and the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory used 20 years of data from MSU's Kellogg Biological Station
The research was funded primarily by the Department of energy's Great lakes Bioenergy Research center the National Science Foundation and MSU Agbioresearch.
#New Antarctic geological timeline aids future sea-level predictionsradiocarbon dates of tiny fossilised marine animals found in Antarctica's seabed sediments offer new clues about the recent rapid
and changes in ocean circulation. Reporting this month in the journal Geology a team of researchers from British Antarctic Survey (BAS) the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research (AWI)
and glacier retreat in the Amundsen Sea region of West Antarctica. The team concludes that the rapid changes observed by satellites over the last 20 years at Pine Island
and ice builds up on the vast Antarctic Ice Sheet the ice flows from the centre of the continent through glaciers towards the sea where it often forms floating ice shelves and eventually breaks off as icebergs.
The science team used gravity corers up to ten metres long to extract mud from the sea floor of the continental shelf in the Amundsen Sea.
which was carved into the sea bed by the glaciers during past ice sheet advances. These locations gave us the best chance to collect the tiny skeletons
but they are normally extremely rare on the Antarctic continental shelf. Co-author Dr James Smith also from BAS adds First we determined the distance between the core locations
Then by dating the type of sediment material deposited at a core site in the open ocean (after the grounding line had moved further landward) we were able to calculate the average rate of glacier retreat over time.
This new research will be used to improve the accuracy of computer models that are essential to predict future ice loss in the Amundsen Sea sector of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet and its likely contribution to global sea-level rise.
Over the last two decades the melting of West Antarctic glaciers has contributed significantly to sea-level rise (recent studies have suggested that continued melting would raise global sea level by up to 0. 3 mm a year.
#Pine beetle outbreak buffers watersheds from nitrate pollutiona research team involving several scientists from the University of Colorado Boulder has found an unexpected silver lining in the devastating pine beetle outbreaks ravaging the West:
and other vegetation that survive pine beetle invasions along waterways increase their uptake of nitrate a common disturbance-related pollutant.
We found that the beetles do not disturb watersheds in the same way as logging
In waterways adjacent to healthy pine forests concentrations of nitrate is generally far lower than in rivers on the plains in the West like the South platte said Lewis. Nitrate pollution is caused by agricultural runoff from populated areas and by permitted
In Colorado many watersheds have lost 80 to 90 percent of their tree canopy as a result of the beetle epidemic said Lewis also a faculty member in CU-Boulder's ecology and evolutionary biology department.
This study shows that at least in some areas it is possible to remove a large part of the tree biomass from a watershed with a very minimal effect on the stream ecosystem he said.
If water resource monitoring detects no insecticide pollution in waterways and as a result no exceeding of the threshold levels this is
Furthermore constructed wetlands should be furnished with plants which according to previous studies of the Institute of Environmental sciences in Landau are capable of reducing pesticide exposure up to 70 per cent.
and leads to coastal ocean problems. The hypoxic zone that forms each summer in the Gulf of mexico is a result of nitrate leaching from the tile-drained Corn belt of the midwestern United states--a likely location for biofuel production he said.
In the study funded by the Energy Biosciences Institute miscanthus switchgrass and mixed prairie species were compared against a typical corn-corn-soybean rotation.
and does liquify at least in small amounts as deep as 250 kilometers in the mantle beneath the ocean floor.
The Rice team focused on mantle beneath the ocean because that's where the crust is created
and spread out to form the ocean crust. The starting point for melting has long been thought to be at 70 kilometers beneath the seafloor.
Seismologists have observed anomalies in their velocity data as deep as 200 kilometers beneath the ocean floor Dasgupta said.
It is found in the animal kingdom in insects inside sea shells and in feathers and is seen also in some plants.
While the trees previously were kept in check by natural annual flooding they can now be found thriving in wetlands swamps and marshes.
but plants above the waterline grew and flowered one year later. The biologists confirmed the importance of water fluctuation using experimental ponds on UCF's main campus. Willow seedlings
At the same time control plants just above the waterline grew over 3 feet tall. Combined the two experiments show that the key to controlling willow is allowing water levels to fluctuate in early spring.
Funded by a grant from California Sea Grant Long set out to discover exactly how these scale insects affect the growth of cordgrass.
Also as climate change raises the sea level the marsh might see its natural salinity level increase.
It serves a buffer for river flow into the ocean. It's really the engineer of its ecosystem.
Environmental flows for ecosystem services in rivers natural and novellast spring the Colorado river reached its delta for the first time in 16 years flowing into Pacific ocean at the Gulf of california after wetting 70 miles of long-dry channels through the Sonoran Desert.
and ease strains on fisheries in the Sea of Cortez (Gulf of california). Environmental flows for natural hybrid and novel riverine ecosystems in a changing worldthere are two primary ways to achieve environmental flows of water necessary to sustain river ecosystems write Mike Acreman
#Mangroves protecting corals from climate changecertain types of corals invertebrates of the sea that have been On earth for millions of years appear to have found a way to survive some of their most destructive threats by attaching to and growing under mangrove roots.
Scientists with the U s. Geological Survey and Eckerd College recently published research on a newly discovered refuge for reef-building corals in mangrove habitats of the U s. Virgin islands.
More than 30 species of reef corals were found growing in Hurricane Hole a mangrove habitat within the Virgin islands Coral reef National monument in St john. Corals are animals that grow in colonies forming reefs over time as old corals die
However some of their most widespread threats involve warming ocean temperatures solar radiation and increased ocean acidification.
No coral reefs have been identified to date that protect from rising ocean temperatures acidification and increased solar radiation like these mangrove habitats in St john. Story Source:
#Food, fuel and more will be produced in sea farms of futuremeet the farm of the future where common seaweed is being upgraded from an environmental problem to a valuable natural resource and raw material.
The excessive fertilisation (eutrophication) of our seas results in an over-production of algae commonly known as seaweed.
Almost three quarters of the earth's surface is covered by sea and the seas possess as great a production capacity as the land.
At the present time humankind utilises 40 per cent of the production from land-based ecosystems
whereas only 1 per cent of the seas'ecosystems are utilised currently. Unfortunately this percentage at present consists largely of ruthless exploitation;
where the fishing industry trawls up every living thing and hoovers the sea bottoms. We really need new solutions such as harvesting the excess algae for fuel
since they form secondary reefs in free bodies of water. This sort of reef attracts fish and other animal species
. What's more we're also acting to help the environment. Partly when we make use of the excess algae
and partly when we cultivate algae that actually absorb nitrogen and phosphorus from the sea.
and are able to grow in the sea. When the algae after about six months have grown on the ropes they are harvested
Mwanza is located on the shores of Lake victoria which is known to be polluted with pesticides and toxic metals including mercury.
Prof Guan and a team of researchers found that 75 per cent of China's lakes
#Predicting impact of climate change on species that cant get out of the waywhen scientists talk about the consequences of climate change it can mean more than how we human beings will be impacted by higher temperatures rising seas and serious storms.
That change has caused carbon-rich wetlands to increase 140 percent while carbon-poor agricultural land decreased about 20 percent according to the study.
Among land-use types researchers also found sugarcane in the soils of the Everglades Agricultural area near Lake Okeechobee and wetlands stored the most soil carbon
Phragmites australis or the common reed is a rapid colonizer that has overrun many coastal wetlands from New england to the Southeast.
and helping restore lost ocean views he said. In fenced in test plots at the USDA Beltsville Agricultural Research center in Maryland Silliman
These chicks will join a flock of about 95 cranes that inhabit wetlands on the refuge and elsewhere in central Wisconsin during the spring and summer.
in order to establish a migratory flock of whooping cranes in the eastern United states. The Eastern Migratory Flock flies south to wetlands in the Southeast United states for the winter.
The USGS Patuxent Wildlife Research center also raises chicks for release into a newly established nonmigratory flock in the wetlands of Southwest Louisiana.
They will earn the migration route by following the ultralight from White river Marsh in Wisconsin to the Gulf Coast of Florida.
Increased feeding by plant-eating tropical fish in temperate waters as a result of ocean warming is an issue of global importance that has the potential to transform marine ecosystems as has also been seen in Japan.
and another species that removes the youngest algal recruits preventing them from making a forest says Dr Vergã s. This research highlights the need to work out how the interactions between different species will change in a warming ocean.
Prevention and real restorationamong the many services that saltmarshes provide coastal protection is of particular importance as sea levels rise due to climate change Bertness said.
and the subsequent rapid decrease in the water level of Lake Saimaa approximately 6000 years ago revealed thousands of square kilometres of new fertile land in eastern Finland.
After dramatic shifts in the waterways human life in the area underwent significant changes and gave rise to a new innovative culture.
and size of the body of water that would later become Lake Saimaa. Approximately 6000 years ago the Salpausselkã¤ridge could no longer hold back the waters
and resulted in an approximately four-metre decrease in the water level of Lake Saimaa revealing thousands of square kilometres of new land in Eastern Finland.
Arrowheads are groups of problematic perennial broadleaf weeds that thrive in rice fields and waterways.
grasslands forests wetlands ocean aridlands islands and coasts. This year's report is also a five-year check in on the indicators presented in the inaugural 2009 State of the Birds report.
Wetlands are one of the habitats to benefit most from conservation. The North american Wetlands Conservation Act has enabled strategic conservation projects covering a collective area larger than Tennessee.
While wetland loss continues in some regions the Act has helped protect and restore wetlands through public-private partnerships across the United states thereby reversing declines in waterfowl populations such as the mallard
and blue-winged teal. In addition to assessing population trends in the seven key habitats the North american Bird Conservation Initiative members created a State of the Birds Watch List.
The 230 species on the list are endangered currently or at risk of becoming endangered without significant conservation.
Forty-two of them are pelagic (open ocean) species. Birds like the Laysan albatross and black-footed albatross are facing increasing levels of oil contamination plastic pollution and greatly reduced amounts of prey fish due to commercial fishing operations.
Rising sea levels due to climate change also put their low-elevation breeding habitats in the Hawaiian and Marshall islands at risk of flooding.
Record greenhouse gas levels impact atmosphere and oceans, WMO report findsthe amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere reached a new record high in 2013 propelled by a surge in levels
Concentrations represent what remains in the atmosphere after the complex system of interactions between the atmosphere biosphere and the oceans.
About a quarter of the total emissions are taken up by the oceans and another quarter by the biosphere reducing in this way the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere.
The ocean cushions the increase in CO2 that would otherwise occur in the atmosphere but with far-reaching impacts.
The current rate of ocean acidification appears unprecedented at least over the last 300 million years according to an analysis in the report.
Carbon dioxide remains in the atmosphere for many hundreds of years and in the ocean for even longer.
Past present and future CO2 emissions will have a cumulative impact on both global warming and ocean acidification.
The inclusion of a section on ocean acidification in this issue of WMO's Greenhouse Gas Bulletin is needed appropriate
It is high time the ocean as the primary driver of the planet's climate and attenuator of climate change becomesa central part of climate change discussions said Wendy Watson-Wright Executive secretary of the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission of UNESCO.
If global warming is not a strong enough reason to cut CO2 emissions ocean acidification should be
Approximately 40%of methane is emitted into the atmosphere by natural sources (e g. wetlands and termites) and about 60%comes from human activities like cattle breeding rice agriculture fossil fuel exploitation landfills and biomass burning.
Nitrous oxide (N2o) Nitrous oxide is emitted into the atmosphere from both natural (about 60%)and anthropogenic sources (approximately 40%)including oceans soil biomass burning fertilizer use and various industrial processes.
which protects us from the harmful ultraviolet rays of the sun. Ocean Acidificationfor the first time this Bulletin contains a section on ocean acidification prepared in collaboration with the International Ocean Carbon Coordination Project (IOCCP) of the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission of UNESCO (IOC
-UNESCO) the Scientific Committee on Oceanic Research (SCOR) and the Ocean Acidification International Coordination Centre (OA-ICC) of the International atomic energy agency (IAEA).
The ocean currently absorbs one-fourth of anthropogenic CO2 emissions reducing the increase in atmospheric CO2 that would
Enhanced ocean CO2 uptake alters the marine carbonate system and lead to increasing acidity. The ocean's acidity increase is already measurable as oceans take up about 4 kilogrammes of CO2 per day per person.
The current rate of ocean acidification appears unprecedented at least over the last 300 million years based on proxy-data from paleo archives.
In the future acidification will continue to accelerate at least until mid-century based on projections from Earth system models.
The potential consequences of ocean acidification on marine organisms are complex. A major concern is the response of calcifying organisms such as corals algae mollusks
http://ds. data. jma. go. jp/gmd/wdcgg) The summary on ocean acidification was produced jointly by the International Ocean Carbon Coordination Project (IOCCP) of the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission of UNESCO
(IOC-UNESCO) the Scientific Committee on Oceanic Research (SCOR) and the Ocean Acidification International Coordination Centre (OA-ICC) of the International atomic energy agency (IAEA.
which is flown on high-altitude aircraft to measure forests land topography ice sheets glaciers and sea ice.
#Ecologist stresses importance of wetlands, grasslands in midwestwetlands may be understood the least ecosystem but their value Is distinguished immense according to Professor W. Carter Johnson of the South dakota State university Department of Natural resource Management.
For more than 40 years the ecologist has studied wetlands along rivers and in the prairie pothole region that extends from Canada through the Dakotas to Iowa.
In recognition of his contributions to wetlands conservation Johnson received the National Wetlands Award for Science Research from the Environmental law Institute.
Since 1989 the National Wetlands Awards program has honored individuals who have demonstrated extraordinary commitment to our nation's wetlands.
Understanding importance of wetlands Through his wetlands research Johnson has sought to help people understand their importance.
and importance to the health of the landscape he noted citing wetlands teaming with birds amphibians and beneficial insects.
In addition wetlands retain floodwaters and filter water naturally. South dakota has a unique legacy in its mixture of lakes wetlands and grasslands.
It's an incredibly beautiful and productive landscape and we haven't treated it very well Johnson said.
Most of the river or riparian wetlands along the Missouri river were lost when the reservoirs were established according to Johnson.
He estimated that 80 percent of the riparian wetlands have been destroyed. The only sizable remnants in South dakota occur below Gavins Point and Fort Randall Dams.
because they require floods and new sandbars to regenerate. American elm is gone mostly from Dutch elm disease and ash trees are being threatened by the emerald ash borer.
Restoring tall prairie grasses Seven years ago Johnson became one of the founders of the Ecosun Prairie Farms to demonstrate the viability of a working grass farm as a means of restoring tall grass prairie and pothole wetlands.
and the highest income levels came from wetland acres. It's a different way of farming Johnson admitted
#New deep sea mushroom-shaped organisms discoveredscientists discovered two new species of sea-dwelling mushroom-shaped organisms according to a study published September 3 2014 in the open
and species. In 1986 the authors of this study collected organisms at 400 and 1000 meters deep on the southeast Australian continental slope and only just recently isolated two types of mushroom-shaped organisms
New mushroom-shaped animals from the deep sea discovered which could not be placed in any recognized group of animals.
when polluted runoff from a rapidly developing watershed overwhelmed the Bay's waters with nutrients causing algae blooms that blocked out much-needed sunlight for underwater plants.
The accumulation of large predatory spiders in these invaded habitats then results in higher mortality for small toads that have emerged recently from wetlands.
Subsurface warming in the ocean explains why global average air temperatures have flatlined since 1999 despite greenhouse gases trapping more solar heat at Earth's surface.
We looked at observations in the ocean to try to find the underlying cause. The results show that a slow-moving current in the Atlantic which carries heat between the two poles sped up earlier this century to draw heat down almost a mile (1500 meters.
Tung and co-author Xianyao Chen of the Ocean University of China who was a UW visiting professor last year used recent observations of deep-sea temperatures from Argo floats that sample the water down to 6500 feet (2000
and Southern oceans Tung said. After 30 years of rapid warming in the warm phase now it's time for the cool phase.
When observations show the ocean cycle flipped around the year 2000 the current began to draw heat deeper into the ocean working to counteract human-driven warming.
and Latin america The European space agency's Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity mission measures soil moisture at a resolution of 31 miles (50 kilometers) but because soil moisture can vary on a much smaller scale its data
than the state of Wisconsin--experienced changes in land cover including a decline in wetlands
Overall 8. 2 percent of the nation's ocean and Great lakes coastal regions experienced these changes.
change risks such as loss of coastal barriers to sea level rise and storm surge and includes environmental data that can help coastal managers improve community resilience.
in Charleston S. C. Among the significant changes were the loss of 1536 square miles of wetlands and a decline in total forest cover by 6. 1 percent.
The findings mirror similar changes in coastal wetland land cover loss reported in the November 2013 report Status
and Trends of Wetlands in the Coastal Watersheds of the Conterminous United states 2004 to 2009 an interagency supported analysis published by the U s. Fish and Wildlife Service and NOAA.
Both wetlands and forest cover are critical to the promotion and protection of coastal habitat for the nation's multi-billion dollar commercial and recreational fishing industries..
Wetland loss due to development equals 642 square miles a disappearance rate averaging 61 football fields lost daily.
The ability to mitigate the growing evidence of climate change along our coasts with rising sea levels already impacting coastlines in ways not imaged just a few years ago makes the data available through the Land Cover Atlas program critically important to coastal resilience planning said Margaret
Davidson National Ocean Service senior advisor for coastal inundation and resilience science services. C-CAP data identify a wide variety of land cover changes that can intensify climate change risks-for example forest
or wetland losses that threaten to worsen flooding and water quality issues or weaken the area's fishing and forestry industries.
For instance the atlas has helped its users assess sea level rise hazards in Florida's Miami-Dade County high-risk areas for stormwater runoff in southern California and the best habitat restoration sites in two watersheds
of the Great lakes. Selected Regional Findings--1996 to 2011: All C-CAP data sets are featured on the Digital Coast.
Tools like the Digital Coast are important components of NOAA's National Ocean Service's efforts to protect coastal resources and keep communities safe from coastal hazards by providing data tools
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