An Empirical Model to Predict in situ Grazing Rates of Diaptomus minutus Lilljeborg on Small Algal Particles

1986 ◽  
Vol 43 (5) ◽  
pp. 1065-1070 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patricia Chow-Fraser

Grazing rates of Diaptomus minutus were measured in situ in six lakes in south-central Ontario using the tracer species Chlorella vulgaris and Scenedesmus ovalis. An empirical model was constructed to predict grazing rate as a function of the relative proportion of small (<10 μm)to large (10–30 μm) algal particles in the nanoplankton. It accurately predicted diaptomid grazing rates for three lakes in an independent lake set; however, it produced overestimates for two other lakes. There was also a significant positive correlation between grazing rate and the biomass concentration of small algae in the lakes. Difference in ambient lake temperature did not contribute significantly towards explained variation in grazing rate; prosome length was also a poor predictor of grazing rate. In parallel experiments, diaptomid grazing rates were higher when Pediastrum was used than when Scenedesmus was used as the tracer; in a similar set of experiments, grazing rates were higher when Chlamydomonas was used than when Scenedesmus was used.


2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (22) ◽  
pp. 4535
Author(s):  
Arnaldo Collazo Aranda ◽  
Daniela Rivera-Ruiz ◽  
Lien Rodríguez-López ◽  
Pablo Pedreros ◽  
José Luis Arumí-Ribera ◽  
...  

Lake temperature has proven to act as a good indicator of climate variability and change. Thus, a surface temperature analysis at different temporal scales is important, as this parameter influences the physical, chemical, and biological cycles of lakes. Here, we analyze monthly, seasonal, and annual surface temperature trends in south central Chilean lakes during the 2000–2016 period, using MODIS satellite imagery. To this end, 14 lakes with a surface area greater than 10 km2 were examined. Results show that 12 of the 14 lakes presented a statistically significant increase in surface temperature, with a rate of 0.10 °C/decade (0.01 °C/year) over the period. Furthermore, some of the lakes in the study present a significant upward trend in surface temperature, especially in spring, summer, and winter. In general, a significant increase in surface water temperature was found in lakes located at higher altitudes, such as Maule, Laja and Galletué lakes. These results contribute to the provision of useful data on Chilean lakes for managers and policymakers.



2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Emma Lodes ◽  
Dirk Scherler ◽  
Hella Wittmann ◽  
Renee Van Dongen

&lt;p&gt;Rock fracturing induced by tectonic deformation is thought to promote faster denudation in more highly fractured areas by lowering grain size and directing the flow of water. That the density and pattern of fractures in a landscape play a role in controlling erosion and landscape evolution has been known for over a century, but not until recently do we have tools, like cosmogenic nuclides, to quantify erosion rates in places with varying fracture densities. In the Nahuelbuta Range in south-central Chile, we observed that &gt;30-m thick regolith exists next to patches of unweathered bedrock. We hypothesize that the density of fractures dictates the pace and patterns of chemical weathering, regolith conversion, and erosion in the Nahuelbuta Range. To test this, we used in situ cosmogenic &lt;sup&gt;10&lt;/sup&gt;Be to obtain denudation rates from amalgamated samples of bedrock, corestones and soils, and measured fracture density and orientation, as well as hillslope boulder size in several sites in the Nahuelbuta Range. We found that more highly fractured areas indeed have higher denudation rates than less fractured areas, and that bedrock denudation rates are ~10 m/Myr while soil denudation rates are ~30 m/Myr, suggesting that soil-covered areas may be sites of higher fracture density at depth. Fractures have orientations that match mapped faults across the Nahuelbuta range, and thus are considered to be tectonically-induced. In addition, both fracture and fault orientations match the orientation of streams incising the range, suggesting that fractures control stream channel orientation by weakening bedrock and thus directing flow.&lt;/p&gt;



2018 ◽  
Vol 47 (3) ◽  
pp. 296-302 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zakaria A. Mohamed ◽  
Asmaa A. Bakr ◽  
Hamed A. Ghramh

Abstract Grazing of zooplankton on phytoplankton may contribute to a reduction of harmful cyanobacteria in eutrophic waters. However, the feeding capacity and interaction between zooplankton and toxic cyanobacteria vary among grazer species. In this study, laboratory feeding experiments were designed to measure the grazing rate of the copepod Cyclops vicinus on Microcystis aeruginosa and the potential microcystin (MC) accumulation in the grazer. Copepods were fed a mixed diet of the edible green alga Ankistrodesmus falcatus and toxic M. aeruginosa for 10 days. The results showed that C. vicinus efficiently ingested toxic Microcystis cells with high grazing rates, varying during the feeding period (68.9–606.3 Microcystis cells animal-1 d-1) along with Microcystis cell density. Microcystis cells exhibited a remarkable induction in MC production under grazing conditions with concentrations 1.67–12.5 times higher than those in control cultures. Furthermore, C. vicinus was found to accumulate MCs in its body with concentrations increasing during the experiment (0.05–3.21 μg MC animal-1). Further in situ studies are needed to investigate the ability of Cyclops and other copepods to assimilate and detoxify MCs at environmentally relevant concentrations before deciding on the biocontrol of Microcystis blooms by copepods.



Ocean Science ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 14 (4) ◽  
pp. 751-768 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cale A. Miller ◽  
Katie Pocock ◽  
Wiley Evans ◽  
Amanda L. Kelley

Abstract. The commercially available Sea-Bird SeaFET™ provides an accessible way for a broad community of researchers to study ocean acidification and obtain robust measurements of seawater pH via the use of an in situ autonomous sensor. There are pitfalls, however, that have been detailed in previous best practices for sensor care, deployment, and data handling. Here, we took advantage of two distinctly different coastal settings to evaluate the Sea-Bird SeaFET™ and examine the multitude of scenarios in which problems may arise confounding the accuracy of measured pH. High-resolution temporal measurements of pH were obtained during 3- to 5-month field deployments in three separate locations (two in south-central Alaska, USA, and one in British Columbia, Canada) spanning a broad range of nearshore temperature and salinity conditions. Both the internal and external electrodes onboard the SeaFET™ were evaluated against robust benchtop measurements for accuracy using the factory calibration, an in situ single-point calibration, or an in situ multi-point calibration. In addition, two sensors deployed in parallel in Kasitsna Bay, Alaska, USA, were compared for inter-sensor variability in order to quantify other factors contributing to the sensor's intrinsic inaccuracies. Based on our results, the multi-point calibration method provided the highest accuracy (< 0.025 difference in pH) of pH when compared against benchtop measurements. Spectral analysis of time series data showed that during spring in Alaskan waters, a range of tidal frequencies dominated pH variability, while seasonal oceanographic conditions were the dominant driver in Canadian waters. Further, it is suggested that spectral analysis performed on initial deployments may be able to act as an a posteriori method to better identify appropriate calibration regimes. Based on this evaluation, we provide a comprehensive assessment of the potential sources of uncertainty associated with accuracy and precision of the SeaFET™ electrodes.



2014 ◽  
Vol 7 (6) ◽  
pp. 8399-8432 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. Samuelsen ◽  
C. Hansen ◽  
H. Wehde

Abstract. The HYCOM-NORWECOM modeling system is used both for basic research and as a part of the forecasting system for the Arctic Marine Forecasting Centre through the MyOcean project. Here we present a revised version of this model. The present model, as well as the sensitivity simulations leading up to this version, has been compared to a dataset of in-situ measurements of nutrient and chlorophyll from the Norwegian Sea and the Atlantic sector of the Arctic Ocean. The revisions having most impact included adding diatoms to the diet of micro-zooplankton, increasing micro-zooplankton grazing rate and decreased silicate-to-nitrate ratio in diatoms. Model runs are performed both with a coarse- (~50 km) and higher-resolution (~15 km) model configuration, both covering the North Atlantic and Arctic Ocean. While the new model formulation improves the results in both the coarse- and high-resolution model, the nutrient bias is smaller in the high-resolution model, probably as a result of the better resolution of the main processes and with that improved circulation. The final revised version delivers satisfactory results for all three nutrients as well as improved result for chlorophyll in terms of the annual cycle amplitude. However, for chlorophyll the correlation with in-situ data remains relatively low. Besides the large uncertainties associated with observational data this is possibly caused by the fact that constant C / N and Chl / N ratios are implemented in the model.





2014 ◽  
Vol 10 (S309) ◽  
pp. 117-120
Author(s):  
Michaela Hirschmann ◽  
Thorsten Naab

AbstractWe investigate the origin of stellar metallicity gradients in massive galaxies at large radii (r > 2 Reff) using ten cosmological zoom simulations of halos with 6 × 1012M⊙ < Mhalo < 2 × 1013M⊙. The simulations follow metal cooling and enrichment from SNII, SNIa and AGB winds. We explore the differential impact of an empirical model for galactic winds that reproduces the evolution of the mass-metallicity relation. At larger radii, the galaxies become more dominated by stars accreted from satellite galaxies in major and minor mergers. In the wind model, fewer stars are accreted, but they are significantly more metal poor resulting in steep global metallicity (〈 ▽ Zstars 〉= -0.35 dex/dex) gradients in agreement with observations. Metallicity gradients of models without winds are inconsistent with observations. For the wind model, stellar accretion is steepening existing in-situ metallicity gradients by about 0.2 dex by the present day and is required to match observed gradients. Metallicity gradients are significantly steeper for systems, which have accreted stars in minor mergers. In contrast, galaxies with major mergers have relatively flat gradients, confirming previous results. We highlight the importance of stellar accretion for stellar population properties of massive galaxies at large radii, which provide important constraints for formation models.



2012 ◽  
Vol 1485 ◽  
pp. 107-112
Author(s):  
Jorge López-Cuevas ◽  
Magaly V. Ramos-Ramírez ◽  
José L. Rodríguez-Galicia

ABSTRACTBa0.75Sr0.25AlSi2O8 (SBAS) - Al2O3 composites, with SBAS/Al2O3 weight ratios of: (a) 90/10, (b) 70/30, and (c) 50/50, are in situ synthesized by reactive sintering at 900-1500°C/5h. The effect of mechanical activation of the precursor mixtures for 0, 4 or 8h in an attrition milling device on the microstructure and phase composition of the composites is studied. Only SBAS and Al2O3 phases are obtained at 1300-1500°C, independently of milling time. In general, the relative proportion of the desirable monoclinic SBAS (Celsian) phase increases in the materials with increasing milling time and sintering temperature, which is enhanced by their SrO content. The promotion of surface nucleation of the undesirable hexagonal SBAS (Hexacelsian) phase by mechanical activation results in a maximum Hexacelsian to Celsian conversion fraction of only 81.4%, obtained for composition 2 milled for 8h and sintered at 1500°C/5h. Under these synthesis conditions, an increment in the amount and size of the Al2O3 particles in the composites is detrimental for the Hexacelsian to Celsian conversion.





2021 ◽  
Vol 3 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah Schönbrodt-Stitt ◽  
Nima Ahmadian ◽  
Markus Kurtenbach ◽  
Christopher Conrad ◽  
Nunzio Romano ◽  
...  

Reliable near-surface soil moisture (θ) information is crucial for supporting risk assessment of future water usage, particularly considering the vulnerability of agroforestry systems of Mediterranean environments to climate change. We propose a simple empirical model by integrating dual-polarimetric Sentinel-1 (S1) Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) C-band single-look complex data and topographic information together with in-situ measurements of θ into a random forest (RF) regression approach (10-fold cross-validation). Firstly, we compare two RF models' estimation performances using either 43 SAR parameters (θNovSAR) or the combination of 43 SAR and 10 terrain parameters (θNovSAR+Terrain). Secondly, we analyze the essential parameters in estimating and mapping θ for S1 overpasses twice a day (at 5 a.m. and 5 p.m.) in a high spatiotemporal (17 × 17 m; 6 days) resolution. The developed site-specific calibration-dependent model was tested for a short period in November 2018 in a field-scale agroforestry environment belonging to the “Alento” hydrological observatory in southern Italy. Our results show that the combined SAR + terrain model slightly outperforms the SAR-based model (θNovSAR+Terrain with 0.025 and 0.020 m3 m−3, and 89% compared to θNovSAR with 0.028 and 0.022 m3 m−3, and 86% in terms of RMSE, MAE, and R2). The higher explanatory power for θNovSAR+Terrain is assessed with time-variant SAR phase information-dependent elements of the C2 covariance and Kennaugh matrix (i.e., K1, K6, and K1S) and with local (e.g., altitude above channel network) and compound topographic attributes (e.g., wetness index). Our proposed methodological approach constitutes a simple empirical model aiming at estimating θ for rapid surveys with high accuracy. It emphasizes potentials for further improvement (e.g., higher spatiotemporal coverage of ground-truthing) by identifying differences of SAR measurements between S1 overpasses in the morning and afternoon.



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