importance of ekman transport and gyre circulation change on seasonal variation of surface dissolved iron in the western subarctic north pacific iron fe is an essential nutrient for marine phytoplankton and it constitutes an important element in the marine carbon cycle in the ocean this study examined the mechanisms controlling seasonal variation of dissolved fe dfe in the western subarctic north pacific wsnp using an ocean general circulation model coupled with a simple biogeochemical model incorporating a dfe cycle fed by two major sources atmospheric dust and continental shelf sediment the model reproduced the seasonal cycle of observed concentrations of dfe and macro nutrients at the surface in the oyashio region with maxima in winter february march and minima in summer july september although the simulated seasonal amplitudes are a half of the observed values analysis of the mixed layer dfe budget indicated that both local vertical entrainment and lateral advection are primary contributors to the wintertime increase in dfe concentration in early winter strengthened northwesterly winds excite southward ekman transport and ekman upwelling over the western subarctic gyre transporting dfe rich water southward in mid to late winter the southward western boundary current of the subarctic gyre and the outflow from the sea of okhotsk also bring dfe rich water to the oyashio region the contribution of atmospheric dust to the dfe budget is several times smaller than these ocean transport processes in winter these results suggest that the westerly wind induced ekman transport and gyre circulation systematically influence the seasonal cycle of wsnp surface dfe concentration

morphology and environment of cold water coral carbonate mounds on the nw european margin cold water coral carbonate mounds owing their presence mainly to the framework building coral lophelia pertusa and the activity of associated organisms are common along the european margin with their spatial distribution allowing them to be divided into a number of mound provinces variation in mound attributes are explored via a series of case studies on mound provinces that have been the most intensely investigated belgica hovland pelagia logachev and norwegian mounds morphological variation between mound provinces is discussed under the premise that mound morphology is an expression of the environmental conditions under which mounds are initiated and grow cold water coral carbonate mounds can be divided into those exhibiting inherited morphologies where mound morphology reflects the morphology of the colonised features and developed morphology where the mounds assume their own gross morphology mainly reflecting dominant hydrodynamic controls finer scale surface morphological features mainly reflecting biological growth forms are also discussed

cold water coral habitats of rockall and porcupine bank ne atlantic ocean sedimentary facies and benthic foraminiferal assemblages the extent of the cold water coral mounds in the modern ocean basins has been recently revealed by new state of the art equipment however not much is known about their geological extent or development through time in the facies model presented here seven different types of seabed substrate are distinguished which may be used for reconstruction of fossil coral habitats the studied substrates include off mound settings foram sands hardgrounds dead coral debris and substrates characterized by a variable density of living coral framework whereas sediment characteristics only provide a basis for distinguishing on and off mound habitats and the loci of most prolific coral growth benthic foraminiferal assemblages are the key to identifying different mound substrates in more detail specific foraminiferal assemblages are distinguished that are characteristic of these specific environments assemblages from off mound settings are dominated by attached epifaunal species such as cibicides refulgens and cibicides variabilis the attached epibenthic species discanomalina coronata is also common in off mound sediments but it is most abundant where hardgrounds have formed in contrast the settings with coral debris or living corals attract shallow infaunal species that are associated with more fine grained soft sediments the typical living coral assemblage is composed of cassidulina obtusa bulimina marginata and cassidulina laevigata the abundance of these species shows an almost linear increase with the density of the living coral cover the benthic foraminifera encountered from off mound to top mound settings appear to represent a gradient of decreasing current intensity and availability of suspended food particles and increasing availability of organic matter associated with fine grained sediment trapped in between coral framework

reefs of the deep the biology and geology of cold water coral ecosystems coral reefs are generally associated with shallow tropical seas however recent deep ocean exploration using advanced acoustics and submersibles has revealed unexpectedly widespread and diverse coral ecosystems in deep waters on continental shelves slopes seamounts and ridge systems around the world advances reviewed here include the use of corals as paleoclimatic archives and their biogeological functioning biodiversity and biogeography threats to these fragile long lived and rich ecosystems are mounting the impacts of deep water trawling are already widespread and effects of ocean acidification are potentially devastating

estimates of atmospheric processed soluble iron from observations and a global mineral aerosol model biogeochemical implications 1 desert dust deposition to the ocean may be a significant source of biogeochemically important elements specifically iron the bioavailability of iron in the oceans requires it to be in a soluble form and because atmospheric iron in desert dust is typically insoluble understanding the atmospheric processes that convert insoluble iron to more soluble forms is essential understanding these relationships is especially important in remote ocean regions where iron may be the limiting nutrient observations of soluble iron from 2001 cruise based aerosol measurements over the atlantic and pacific oceans ranged from 0 to 45 mean of 4 9 in the fine mode 2 5 m in diameter and 0 to 87 mean of 2 10 in the coarse mode we test two simple hypotheses of soluble iron enhancement in the atmosphere using a global model of mineral aerosols the first method assumes that iron solubility increases as iron is exposed to solar radiation approximating photoreduction reactions that are important pathways for enhancement of soluble iron in the presence of acidic solutions the second process imitates cloud processing of iron by increasing the amount of soluble iron when the mineral aerosol comes into contact with a cloud both methods resulted in similar average magnitudes of percent soluble iron compared to observations but did not capture specific events or have sufficient variability perhaps because the model does not include aerosol interactions between species other than mineral dust or other processes that may be important

210pb derived sediment accumulation and mixing rates for the washington continental slope abstract total sediment accumulation rates g yr in four canyons indenting the washington continental shelf are about twice those on the nearby open slope even though canyons comprise less than 40 of the depositional area of the entire slope this is because 210 pb derived sediment accumulation rates g cm 2 yr for astoria and quinault canyons are 3 4 times greater than those for willapa and grays canyons and intermediate open slope areas supporting the hypothesis that columbia river derived solids are preferentially transported to these two canyons quinault canyon currently appears to be accumulating solids at rates much greater than its low long term accumulation rate which is attributed to turbidity currents transporting solids down this canyon roughly every 500 years the following four different approaches all show that mixing may cause 210 pb derived sediment accumulation rates for slope and canyon sediments to be 2 3 times higher than true accumulation rates 1 comparison between accumulation rates calculated from 210 pb profiles with and without surface zones in which mixing has obviously affected 210 pb distributions 2 comparison between 210 pb derived and independently determined long term accumulation rates 3 comparison between 210 pb derived accumulation and modern columbia river discharge rates 4 comparison between two and three layer steady state one dimensional diffusion advection decay models mixing coefficients for surface sediments calculated using a one dimensional two layer vertical eddy diffusion model show large differences within the region with most in the 3 30 cm 2 yr range mixing rates are several times larger in canyon sediments from 0 2 1 1 km water depth probably due to physical reworking processes erroneously neglected mixing at depth of no more than 5 of that calculated for the surface mixed layer can cause the 2 3 fold calculated overestimation of true sediment accumulation rates and 2 4 fold calculated underestimation of true mixing coefficients

giant carbonate mud mounds in the southern rockall trough seismic profiles sidescan sonar data bottom photography and sampling proved for the first time that there are giant carbonate mounds bioherms in the rockall trough the pelagia mounds on the northern porcupine bank are relatively isolated whereas most of the logachev mounds on the southeast rockall bank form a field of closely spaced contiguous mounds they are all found on the upper slope at depths between about 500 and 1200 m and as a result of this study about 500 have been mapped they have a variety of shapes and the larger ones are very steep sided up to 350 m high and 2 km wide at the base sediment samples show that the mounds consist of pale coloured muds mainly aragonite usually with live and or dead cold water corals at the seafloor and with buried dead corals coral thickets appear to be detected as a brush like signature on high resolution profiles and as a speckled pattern on high resolution sidescan sonar records shelly sands are found on the seabed between the mounds currents in the mound areas are strong enough to transport sands along slope as medium sized sand waves and to prevent pelagic deposition thus providing surfaces for initial coral settlement by the winnowing of fines to leave glacial dropstones and exposed rocks these observations show that the poleward directed upper slope current of the eastern north atlantic extends further south than hitherto known and that there is a southwesterly directed current on rockall bank there are waves on the logachev mounds with a wavelength of about 20 30 m that are thought to be moulded in carbonate muds by across slope directed internal tidal currents and or cascading currents mounds develop above erosional surfaces seen on seismic data the huge amount of carbonate mud seems to be produced by the rapid growth and breakdown of cold water corals living in a very favourable environment intermediate nepheloid layers formed upstream by the strong currents may provide the food source for the deep water suspension feeders conditions for giant mound growth require an ideal balance between current speed and sedimentation rate among other factors no evidence for the suggested link to methane seepage has been found so far

direct observations of microscale turbulence and thermohaline structure in the kuroshio front 1 direct observations of microstructure near the kuroshio front were conducted in august 2008 and october 2009 these show negative potential vorticity pv in the mixed layer south of the front where directly measured turbulent kinetic energy dissipation rates are an order magnitude larger than predicted by wind scaling these elevated dissipation rates scale better with an empirical scaling which considers local wind and ekman buoyancy flux driven by downfront wind near zero pv in the thermocline under the kuroshio mainstream is observed at 200 300 m depth with dissipation exceeding open ocean thermocline values by factors of 10 100 overall the large turbulent dissipation rates measured in the kuroshio can be categorized into two groups one characterized by low richardson number along the kuroshio front thermocline and the other characterized by high stratification away from the kuroshio mainstream the former is attributed to mixing by unbalanced frontal ageostrophic flows and the latter is attributed to internal wave breaking on average both groups appear in regions of large horizontal density gradients observed thermohaline structure shows low salinity tongues from the surface to over 300 m depth and deep cold tongues extending upward from 500 to 100 m depth in a narrow 20 km zone suggesting down and upwelling driven by geostrophic straining which is confirmed by quasigeostrophic omega equation solutions this implies that adiabatic along isopycnal subduction and diabatic diapycnal turbulent mixing acting in tandem at the kuroshio front likely contribute to npiw formation

trends in the solubility of iron in dust dominated aerosols in the equatorial atlantic trade winds importance of iron speciation and sources 1 we present measurements of the solubility of fe ii and fe iii extracted from bulk and size fractionated african dust collected in summer trade winds at barbados west indies iron solubilities typically ranged from 1 to 3 fe iii dominates the iron solubility over the entire range of particle sizes at mineral dust concentrations below about 5 ug m3 fe ii believed to be largely derived from anthropogenic and biomass burning sources becomes increasingly important samples containing large soluble iron fractions and high fe ii fe iii ratios are associated with south atlantic back trajectories the gray coloration of the filters suggests that the source may be biomass burning in southern africa in general much of the variability in fe solubility is linked to fe ii concentration changes vanadium is often used as a tracer of anthropogenic impacts although many of our samples yielded v ti ratios much greater than average crustal abundances we could find no relationship between the enrichment of v and fe solubility our fe solubility results are quite similar to those obtained by others despite the fact that the measurements were made in diverse ocean regions and the protocols used were quite different in all cases this uniformity implies that the factors controlling aerosol iron solubility are largely inherent in the properties of the aerosols themselves and not the procedures used to extract the iron our results suggest that dust transport models that focus on the role of iron in ocean biogeochemistry must take into account aerosol origin in order to better model the solubility of iron

observations of energetic high wavenumber internal waves in the kuroshio abstract intense and spatially coherent shear layers were detected in and under the kuroshio in an april 2000 survey in the east china sea the sloping layers revealed by shipboard doppler sonars on the r v roger revelle appeared to cross isopycnal surfaces except in a small region near the kuroshio shelfbreak front the rms finescale shear associated with the layers significantly exceeded the geostrophic shear an april 2002 follow on cruise was organized to establish whether these motions were propagating internal waves shipboard and lowered adcps were both operated from the r v melville in addition to ctd sonar transects a 30 h time series of currents and shear was obtained in the core of the kuroshio near the island of kyushu japan the shear structures were indeed found to be propagating with both up and down going internal wave motions present in comparison with the nearby open ocean the finescale 160 m vertical shear variance is increased by a factor of 3 in the kuroshio and by a fact

evidence of enhanced turbulent dissipation in the frontogenetic kuroshio front thermocline 1 enhanced turbulent dissipation o 10 8 10 7 wkg 1 in the thermocline on the cyclonic side of the kuroshio front was observed during a period of frontogenesis using a microstructure profiler xbt and adcp along 143 e across the kuroshio front in august 2008 the eddy diffusivity corresponding to the mixing below the central jet is estimated to be o 10 4 10 3 m2 s 1 the strong turbulent mixing we observed in the kuroshio is in sharp contrast to previous field measurements which found that small scale diapycnal mixing in western boundary currents remains at levels typically measured in the open ocean thermocline the turbulence in the kuroshio is attributed to frontogenesis arising out of an estimated confluence rate of o 10 5 s 1 based on satellite altimeters suggesting the ubiquity of a forward energy cascade from mesoscale to microscale turbulence near ocean fronts as indicated by recent theoretical studies

size sorting in marine muds processes pitfalls and prospects for paleoflow speed proxies the basis for and use of fine grain size parameters for inference of paleoflow speeds is reviewed here the basis resides in data on deposited sediment taken in conjunction with flow speed measurements in the field experimental data on suspended sediment transport and deposition and theoretical treatments of the generation of size distributions of deposits from suspension controlled by particle settling velocity and flow speed in the deep sea sorting events occur under resuspension deposition events in benthic storms at flow speeds below 10 15 cm s 1 size in the noncohesive sortable silt 10 63 m range is controlled by selective deposition whereas above that range removal of finer material by winnowing also plays a role the best particle size instruments to measure a flow speed related grain size employ the settling velocity method while laser diffraction sizers can yield misleading results because of particle shape effects potential problems including source effects downslope supply on continental margins spatial variability of flow over bedforms and influence of ice rafted detritus are examined a number of studies using the sortable silt flow speed proxy are reviewed and inverse modeling of grain size distributions is examined outstanding problems are that corroboration is sparse because almost no studies have yet used the full range of proxies for flow rate and water mass identification and that the sortable silt mean size is not yet properly calibrated in terms of flow speed

friction frontogenesis and the stratification of the surface mixed layer the generation and destruction of stratification in the surface mixed layer of the ocean is understood to result from vertical turbulent transport of buoyancy and momentum driven by air sea fluxes and stresses in this paper it is shown that the magnitude and penetration of vertical fluxes are strongly modified by horizontal gradients in buoyancy and momentum a classic example is the strong restratification resulting from frontogenesis in regions of confluent flow frictional forces acting on a baroclinic current either imposed externally by a wind stress or caused by the spindown of the current itself also modify the stratification by driving ekman flows that differentially advect density ekman flow induced during spindown always tends to restratify the fluid while wind driven ekman currents will restratify or destratify the mixed layer if the wind stress has a component up or down front i e directed against or with the geostrophic shear respectively scalings are constructed for the relative importance of friction versus frontogenesis in the restratification of the mixed layer and are tested using numerical experiments of mixed layer fronts forced by both winds and a strain field the scalings suggest and the numerical experiments confirm that for wind stress magnitudes mixed layer depths and cross front density gradients typical of the ocean wind induced friction often dominates frontogenesis in the modification of the stratification of the upper ocean the experiments reveal that wind induced destratification is weaker in magnitude than restratification because the stratification generated by up front winds confines the turbulent stress to a depth shallower than the ekman layer which enhances the frictional force ekman flow and differential advection of density frictional destratification is further reduced over restratification because the stress associated with the geostrophic shear at the surface tends to compensate a down front wind stress

growth and erosion of a cold water coral covered carbonate mound in the northeast atlantic during the late pleistocene and holocene the first detailed stratigraphic record from a deep water carbonate mound in the northeast atlantic based on absolute datings u th and ams 14c and stable oxygen isotope records reveals that its top sediment sequences are condensed by numerous hiatuses according to stable isotope data mainly sediments with an intermediate signal are preserved on the mound while almost all fully glacial and interglacial sediments have either not been deposited or have been eroded later the resulting hiatuses reduce the late pleistocene sediment accumulation at propeller mound to amounts smaller than the background sedimentation the hiatuses most likely result due to the sweeping of the mound in turn with the re establishment of vigour interglacial circulation patterns after sluggish current regimes during glacials thus within the discussion if internal fluid driven or external environmentally driven processes control the evolution of such carbonate mounds our findings for propeller mound clearly point to environmental forcing as the dominant mechanism shaping deep water carbonate mounds in the ne atlantic during the late pleistocene and holocene

millennial scale glacial variability versus holocene stability changes in planktic and benthic foraminifera faunas and ocean circulation in the north atlantic during the last 60 000 years two piston cores ds97 2p from the reykjanes ridge in the central north atlantic ocean 1685 m water depth and enam33 from southwest of the faeroe islands in the ne atlantic 1217 m water depth have been investigated for their planktic and benthic foraminiferal content ds97 2p is situated near the subarctic front and productivity measured by accumulation rates of benthic and planktic foraminifera has been generally high during the holocene the productivity shows a clear decrease from an early holocene maximum to a late holocene minimum coeval changes in the benthic faunas indicate that the food supply changed from large irregular pulses during the early holocene to a more sustained flux during the late holocene presumably in concert with decreasing bottom current activity oxygen conditions in the bottom water became poorer another feature of the late holocene is an increasing instability of the north atlantic thermohaline circulation regime nevertheless the changes in faunal composition and productivity during the holocene were gradual as compared to the discontinuous distribution patterns and abrupt productivity shifts during the glacial the glacial shifts were on a millennial time scale and correlate with the interstadial stadial phases of the dansgaard oeschger cycles in the greenland ice cores the faunas of the warm interstadial phases resembled the holocene faunas and both surface and bottom productivity was high the faunas suggest that the interstadial circulation pattern was very similar to the modern system with convection in the nordic seas and generation of north atlantic deep water the planktic faunas during the cold stadials and heinrich events were completely dominated by the polar species neogloboquadrina pachyderma s and surface conditions were cold and the productivity low the benthic faunas were dominated by species that presently thrive in areas with a low amount of food and reduced oxygen content the water column was probably stratified with low saline cold surface water overlying poorly aerated intermediate water masses

intensive surveys of the azores front 2 inferring the geostrophic and vertical velocity fields the geostrophic and vertical velocity fields are inferred using density and horizontal velocity data from three seasoar acoustic doppler current profiler surveys of the azores front the analysis is a two step procedure consisting of 1 objective analyses to reflect the observed length scales and 2 dynamical adjustments so that the density field is statically stable and the velocity field is in geostrophic balance the vertical velocity is inferred using a version of the quasi geostrophic omega equation in which the stratification is allowed to vary in the horizontal the resulting vertical velocity peaks at 2 10 4 m s 1 at 200 300 m there is a tendency for the denser water to the north of the front to be downwelled while the warmer water to the south is upwelled the implied heat flux exceeds 10 w m 2 near 100 m depth so the upper 100 m is warmed while the lower water column is cooled tending to stratify the upper ocean ageostrophic horizontal flow is toward the dense side of the front at the surface the dominant terms in the density balance are time rate of change and horizontal advection the inferred circulation cells may be an important mechanism of subduction in the upper ocean

north atlantic nordic seas exchanges abstract the northeastern part of the north atlantic is unique in the sense that it is much warmer in the surface than other ocean areas at similar latitudes the main reason for this is the large northward transport of heat that extends to high latitudes and crosses the greenland scotland ridge to enter the nordic seas and the arctic there the warm atlantic water is converted to colder water masses that return southwards over the ridge partly as surface outflows and partly as overflows through the deep passages across the ridge in this paper the state of knowledge on the exchanges especially across the eastern part of the greenland scotland ridge is reviewed based on results from the ices nansen north atlantic norwegian sea exchanges project from the nordic woce project and from other sources the accumulated evidence allows us to describe the exchanges in fair detail the origins of the waters the patterns of their flow towards and over the ridge and their ultimate fate there is also increasing information on temporal variations of the exchanges although dynamical changes are still not well understood quantitative estimates for the volume transport of most of the overflow branches seem reasonably well established and transport measurements of the atlantic inflows to the nordic seas are approaching acceptable levels of confidence which allows preliminary budgets to be presented the deep overflows are driven by pressure gradients set up by the formation of deep and intermediate water the dominance of deep overflows over surface outflows in the water budget argues that this thermohaline forcing also dominates over direct wind stress and estuarine forcing in driving the atlantic water inflow across the greenland scotland ridge while wind stress seems to influence the characteristics and distribution of the atlantic water north of the ridge

foraminiferal stratigraphy and environment of late weichselian deposits on the continental shelf off troms northern norway abstract based on the analysis of 8 selected gravity cores from the upper sediment layers of andfjorden and malangsdjupet off northern norway six late weichselian foraminiferal assemblage zones are defined the two oldest assemblage zones 8 and 7 are found in basal tills and contain mixed faunas reworked and deposited by glaciers which reached the shelf edge during the early late weichselian during the earliest phase of the deglaciation of the continental shelf a sparse fauna characterized by buccella frigida zone 6 was deposited zone 5 is dominated by cassidulina laevigata and a fairly high content of planktic foraminifera indicating periods of ice free normal marine surface waters during a glacial advance between 14 000 and 13 000 b p the fauna zone 4 was dominated by elphidium excavatum this fauna reflects near glacial conditions characterized by unstable bottom water conditions the last c 500 years of this period suffered from oxygen depleted bottom waters zone 3 formed between 13 000 and 10 000 b p comprises several species e g cassidulina reniforme nonion barleeanum n labradoricum and cibicides lobatulus during the first 2000 years of this period the fauna reflects a climatic amelioration e g an increase in temperature salinity and current activity probably due to intrusion of atlantic water during the younger dryas zone 3 reflects a climatic deterioration

intensive surveys of the azores front 1 tracers and dynamics the hypothesis that fronts are sites of active subduction is examined using density temperature salinity and horizontal velocity data from a trio of surveys of the azores front done in may 1991 and march 1992 these surveys were made using a seasoar equipped with a conductivity temperature depth profiler and a shipboard acoustic doppler current profiler the potential density and potential vorticity indicate that dense water from the north side of the front may be sliding down beneath the surface outcrop this apparently subducting isopycnal has a great deal of temperature and salinity variability horizontal velocity is nearly parallel to isopycnals indicating that the time rate of change and vertical advection must be small the thermal wind balance is observed to be valid especially in the region of the largest horizontal density gradients shear at the base of the mixed layer is likely due to near inertial motions the potential vorticity is dominated by the planetary vorticity except at the front where vertical shears the tilting term become large the tilting term acts to reduce the magnitude of the potential vorticity at the front in agreement with simple theoretical models the magnitude of the tilting term is similar to the total vorticity in the seasonal thermocline

spontaneous generation of near inertial waves by the kuroshio front abstractwhile near inertial waves are known to be generated by atmospheric storms recent observations in the kuroshio front find intense near inertial internal wave shear along sloping isopycnals even during calm weather recent literature suggests that spontaneous generation of near inertial waves by frontal instabilities could represent a major sink for the subinertial quasigeostrophic circulation an unforced three dimensional 1 km resolution model initialized with the observed cross kuroshio structure is used to explore this mechanism after several weeks the model exhibits growth of 10 100 km scale frontal meanders accompanied by o 10 mw m 2 spontaneous generation of near inertial waves associated with readjustment of submesoscale fronts forced out of balance by mesoscale confluent flows these waves have properties resembling those in the observations however they are reabsorbed into the model kuroshio front with no more than 15 dissipating or radiating away thus spontaneous generation o

glacial interglacial co2 change the iron hypothesis several explanations for the 200 to 280 ppm glacial interglacial change in atmospheric co2 concentrations deal with variations in southern ocean phytoplankton productivity and the related use or nonuse of major plant nutrients an hypothesis is presented herein in which arguments are made that new productivity in today s southern ocean 7 4 1013g yr 1 is limited by iron deficiency and hence the phytoplankton are unable to take advantage of the excess surface nitrate phosphate that if used could result in total southern ocean new production of 2 3 1015 g c yr 1 as a consequence of fe limited new productivity holocene interglacial co2 levels preindustrial are as high as they were during the last interglacial 280 ppm in contrast atmospheric dust fe supplies were 50 times higher during the last glacial maximum lgm because of this fe enrichment phytoplankton growth may have been greatly enhanced larger amounts of upwelled nutrients may have been used and the resulting stimulation of new productivity may have contributed to the lgm drawdown of atmospheric co2 to levels of less than 200 ppm background information and arguments in support of this hypothesis are presented

dissolution of aerosol iron in the surface waters of the north pacific and north atlantic oceans as determined by a semicontinuous flow through reactor method aerosol iron dissolution in oceanic waters is determined with a semicontinuous batch leaching method in this procedure aerosol samples that were collected from the marine boundary layer were leached in an all teflon flow through reaction chamber by multiple aliquots of similar to 40 ml 0 4 mu m filtered oceanic surface water collected using ultraclean techniques each aliquot of seawater is permitted to leach the aerosol sample in the reaction chamber for a predetermined time before the seawater solution is separated from the aerosol sample by a 0 4 mu m nucleopore filter membrane a new aliquot of seawater is then added to the leaching chamber to continue leaching the same aerosol particles retained on the filter the procedure is repeated with progressive increases in leaching time the method allows the fe released from the aerosol particles to be continuously removed from the system before saturating the complexation capacity of the seawater leaching solution or adsorbing onto the leaching chamber wall this method results in accurate measurements of seawater dissolvable labile aerosol fe that is independent of the total aerosol fe concentrations in the sample the aerosol fe solubility determined using this method ranges from 3 5 1 5 for the north atlantic during september 2005 to 5 7 2 0 for the north pacific during april 2005 and april 2006

ekman layers and two dimensional frontogenesis in the upper ocean a two dimensional modified semi geostrophic model is used to study the evolution of oceanic fronts in the presence of vertical mixing the parameterization used for mixing is an elevated constant value of vertical viscosity and friction hence the ekman layer acts as a surrogate mixed layer with however vertical shear allowed everywhere an initial condition representative of the observed fields in frontal air sea interaction experiment fasinex is used and its modification in the presence of vertical mixing alone is investigated without external forcing an ekman layer results because of the presence of vertical geostrophic shear at the surface the maximum density gradient moves toward the dense side of the front driven by this flow convergence of ekman flow results in downward bowing of the isopycnals beneath the surface expression of the front a feature reminiscent of density sections taken during fasinex this feature is not evident when a barotropic convergence field is applied in the absence of mixing or in fully nonlinear simulations of the evolution of fronts with baroclinic instability an analytic theory suggests that the maximum density gradient will increase over time when vertical mixing alone is present in the presence of negative uniform wind stress in the direction opposite to the surface geostrophic flow the front moves toward the denser water and the jet uniformly decreases in strength in the presence of a positive uniform wind in the direction of the surface geostrophic flow the surface jet initially weakens but then strengthens again as the wind driven ekman flow opposes the frictionally driven ekman flow and the cross front density gradient increases

sedimentary labile organic carbon and pore water redox control on species distribution of benthic foraminifera a case study from lisbon setubal canyon southern portugal abstract rose bengal stained benthic foraminifera were studied from 11 cores collected along two depth transects off southern portugal one in the lisbon setubal canyon and the other along the canyon edge the total standing stocks and distribution of foraminifera were investigated in relation to sediment and pore water geochemistry nitrate was used as a redox indicator sedimentary chlorophyll a and cpe chloroplastic pigment equivalents contents as a measure of labile organic matter and total organic carbon as a measure of bulk organic matter availability the canyon sediments were enriched in organic carbon and phytopigments at all water depths in comparison with the canyon edge water depth seemed to control sedimentary phytopigment content but not total organic carbon no significant correlation was seen between pigment and total organic carbon content the abundance of calcareous foraminifera correlated with the phytodetritus content whereas a weaker correlation was observed for the agglutinated taxa therefore calcareous foraminifera appear to require a fresher food input than agglutinated taxa the foraminiferal species composition also varied with pigment content and nitrate penetration depth in the sediment in line with the trox concept phytopigment rich surficial cpe content 20 g cm3 sediments with a shallow nitrate penetration depth 1 cm depth were inhabited by generally infaunal species such as chilostomella oolina melonis barleeanus and globobulimina spp as the nitrate penetration increased to 2 cm depth in sediment and the pigment content remained relatively high 15 g cm3 uvigerina mediterranea and uvigerina elongatastriata became dominant species with declining cpe content and increasing nitrate penetration depth the foraminiferal assemblages changed from the mesotrophic cibicides kullenbergi uvigerina peregrina assemblage to the oligotrophic abyssal assemblage mainly consisting of agglutinated taxa

the gulf stream north wall ageostrophic circulation and frontogenesis abstracteastward zonal jets are common in the ocean and atmosphere for example the gulf stream and jet stream they are characterized by atypically strong horizontal velocity baroclinic vertical

interaction of superinertial waves with submesoscale cyclonic filaments in the north wall of the gulf stream abstracthigh resolution nearly lagrangian observations of velocity and density made in the north wall of the gulf stream reveal banded shear structures characteristic of near inertial waves niws here the current follows submesoscale dynamics with rossby and richardson numbers near one and the vertical vorticity is positive this allows for a unique analysis of the interaction of niws with a submesoscale current dominated by cyclonic as opposed to anticyclonic vorticity rotary spectra reveal that the vertical shear vector rotates primarily clockwise with depth and with time at frequencies near and above the local coriolis frequency f at some depths more than half of the measured shear variance is explained by clockwise rotary motions with frequencies between f and 1 7f the dominant superinertial frequencies are consistent with those inferred from a dispersion relation for niws in submesoscale currents that depends on the observed aspect ratio of the wave shear as well as the vertical vorticity

evidence of enhanced double diffusive convection below the main stream of the kuroshio extension in this study a navis microrider microstructure float and an em apex float were deployed along the kuroshio extension front the observations deeper than 150 m reveal widespread interleaving thermohaline structures for at least 900 km along the front presumably generated through mesoscale stirring and near inertial oscillations in these interleaving structures microscale thermal dissipation rates are very high o 10 7 k2s 1 while turbulent kinetic energy dissipation rates are relatively low o 10 10 10 9 wkg 1 with effective thermal diffusivity k of o 10 3 m2s 1 consistent with the previous parameterizations for double diffusion and k is two orders of magnitude larger than the turbulent eddy diffusivity for density k the average observed dissipation ratio in salt finger and diffusive convection favorable conditions are 1 2 and 4 0 respectively and are larger than that for turbulence our results suggest that mesoscale subduction obduction and near inertial motions could catalyze double diffusive favorable conditions and thereby enhancing the diapycnal tracer fluxes below the kuroshio extension front

turbulent mixing in the eddy transport of western mediterranean intermediate water to the alboran sea western mediterranean intermediate water wiw is formed in winter in the north western mediterranean wiw identifiable as a distinct temperature minimum layer between atlantic mediterranean interface waters and the denser levantine intermediate water is carried down the east coast of spain in anticyclonic mode water eddies or weddies eventually reaching the alboran sea a previous detailed analysis of a weddy in the vicinity of the almeria oran front indicated that it could have accounted for 10 of a winter s production of wiw but this analysis was unable to consider turbulent dissipation in this study we present microstructure measurements across a similar observation of wiw in the vicinity of the almeria oran front and show that this figure could be conservative by 15 50 due to the turbulent dissipation associated with a weddy

two dimensional ageostrophic secondary circulation at ocean fronts due to vertical mixing and large scale deformation 1 ageostrophic secondary circulation asc in frontal data sets have been previously diagnosed using only adiabatic versions of omega equations this study includes the effect of vertical mixing on such diagnostics modified quasi geostrophic and semigeostrophic balance equations are examined for the existing azores front data sets and idealized fronts in the presence of diabatic vertical mixing as well as a large scale deformation field the relevant dimensionless parameter representing the relative importance of large scale deformation and vertical mixing is the inverse of the ekman number based on the deformation rate h2 ao where is large scale deformation rate h is vertical scale of the front and ao is the maximum vertical eddy viscosity when this parameter is smaller than o 102 the influence of vertical mixing may be important other relevant parameters include burger number bu and prandtl number pr the vertical velocity in ascs caused by diabatic mixing in all diagnostics solutions except for large bu cases shows good agreement with the garrett loder scaling the structure of ascs is found to be sensitive to pr the diagnostics of ascs for the azores front data set indicates that the vertical mixing intensifies the asc in the upper ocean 100 m and should not be neglected when the large scale deformation rate is o 10 6 s 1 or smaller the magnitude of vertical velocity in ascs due to mixing contributions reaches o 10 m d 1 with downwelling on the dense side and upwelling on the less dense side of azores front

the sequence of events surrounding termination ii and their implications for the cause of glacial interglacial co2 changes events surrounding termination ii as preserved in the vostok ice core provide a number of clues about the mechanisms controlling glacial to interglacial climate change antarctic temperature and the atmosphere s co2 content increased together over a period of 8000 years this increase is bounded by a drop in dust flux at its onset and by a drop in the 18o of trapped air at its finish a similar lag between dust flux and foraminiferal 18o is seen in a southern ocean marine record suggesting that the 18o in air trapped in vostok ice is a valid proxy for ice volume the synchronous change of atmospheric co2 and southern hemisphere temperature thus preceded the melting of the northern hemisphere ice sheets this observation coupled with the fact that nutrient reorganization in the north atlantic occurs with or after the sea level rise eliminates many scenarios proposed to explain the co2 rise including those which rely on sea level change conveyor related nutrient redistribution or north atlantic cooling southern ocean scenarios become the front runners but the most popular mechanism iron fertilization has two problems in explaining the co2 rise before termination ii first much of the dust demise occurs prior to the change in co2 so if iron is the villain a threshold value of its supply must be called upon above which productivity does not continue to increase second the co2 rise continues for some 4 5 kyr after the dust flux has fallen to close to zero these problems may be solved if the increased iron supply in dust caused higher rates of nitrogen fixation during the glacial periods in this case the residence time of oceanic nitrate of a few thousand years would enable decreasing productivity to be a global rather than a local phenomenon and would explain the slow rampup of atmospheric co2

recent benthic foraminiferal assemblages in deep high energy environments from the gulf of cadiz spain the benthic environment in the gulf of cadiz north eastern atlantic is strongly affected by the mediterranean outflow water undercurrent mow which flows northwards along the western iberian margin at 500 1500 m water depth foraminiferal census counts of living and dead assemblages from 27 surface samples ranging from 103 to 1917 m water depth and the examination of hard substrates reveal a close correlation of the fauna with the local hydrography and sediment facies four different faunal groups are separated by factor analysis of the living fauna assemblage 1 contains typical lower slope species and dominates samples from the lower mow core layer and in the north atlantic deep water below shelf edge foraminifera are common in assemblage 2a which shows the highest proportions in samples from 103 to 272 m assemblage 2b is dominated by upper slope species and suspension feeders that are frequent in the upper mow core layer and in distal settings between 396 and 901 m species from assemblage 3 prefer epibenthic habitats and are recorded with high proportions exclusively in the immediate flow paths of the upper mow between 496 and 881 m colonisation structures and species composition of epibenthic assemblages from the proximal facies largely differ from those in distal settings in general epibenthic foraminifers only use elevated substrates under the influence of near bottom flow under high current velocities epibenthic foraminifers prefer large and heavy objects they colonise high attachment levels where a maximum yield of advected food particles can be achieved in distal settings at lower flow velocities the elevation height does not exceed 20 mm above the surrounding sediment surface this level is related to a hydrologic transition layer with high concentrations of suspended particles the comparison of microhabitat preferences and faunal structure under high and low current velocities reveal that substrate stability may be a confining environmental variable for endobenthic and shallow epibenthic foraminifers the observations also indicate that the preferential settling height of epibenthic foraminifera is related to the highest lateral flux rates of food particles within reach from the sea floor a dynamic selection of elevated microhabitats is only used by 7 8 of all species recognised in the gulf of cadiz area

destruction of potential vorticity by winds the destruction of potential vorticity pv at ocean fronts by wind stress driven frictional forces is examined using pv flux formalism and numerical simulations when a front is forced by downfront winds that is winds blowing in the direction of the frontal jet a nonadvective frictional pv flux that is upward at the sea surface is induced the flux extracts pv out of the ocean leading to the formation of a boundary layer thicker than the ekman layer with nearly zero pv and nonzero stratification the pv reduction is not only active in the ekman layer but is transmitted through the boundary layer via secondary circulations that exchange low pv from the ekman layer with high pv from the pycnocline extraction of pv from the pycnocline by the secondary circulations results in an upward advective pv flux at the base of the boundary layer that scales with the surface nonadvective frictional pv flux and that leads to the deepening of the layer at fronts forced by both downfront winds and a destabilizing atmospheric buoyancy flux f b the critical parameter that determines whether the wind or the buoyancy flux is the dominant cause for pv

aerosol iron and aluminum solubility in the northwest pacific ocean results from the 2002 ioc cruise dust aerosol samples were collected across the western north pacific ocean during may june 2002 samples were analyzed for soluble aerosol fe ii fe ii fe iii and al as well as major cations and anions the aerosol samples were leached using a 10 second exposure to either filtered surface seawater or ultrapure deionized water yielding a measure of the instantaneous soluble fraction a variety of analytical methods were employed including 57fe isotope dilution high resolution icp ms energy dispersive x ray fluorescence graphite furnace aas ion chromatography and the felume chemiluminescent technique fe was found to be more soluble in ultrapure deionized water leaches especially during periods of higher dust concentrations fe solubility averaged 9 8 in ultrapure water leaches and 6 5 in seawater leaches significant correlations were found between both soluble aerosol fet and soluble fe ii concentrations and aerosol acidity however the percentages of soluble aerosol fet and fe ii did not correlate with aerosol acidity we also did not observe significant correlations between total and soluble aerosol fe concentrations and the concentrations of either particulate fe or dissolved fe in surface waters

iron distributions in the water column of the japan basin and yamato basin japan sea 1 in the japan and yamato basins japan sea dissolved fe d fe 0 22 m fraction was characterized by surface depletion mid depth maxima then a slight decrease with depth in deep water and uniform concentration in bottom waters because of biological uptake in the surface water and release by microbial decomposition of sinking organic matter in mid depth waters total fe concentrations t fe in the surface water of the japan sea were 1 4 nm a little higher than those in the surface waters of the nutrient deficient subtropical western north pacific and extremely higher than the nutrient rich subarctic western north pacific and the nutrient deficient subtropical central north pacific resulting from high atmospheric fe input to nutrient depleted surface water of the japan sea in the japan basin the t fe in bottom water were lower than those in deep water resulting from 1 the injection of new bottom water with the lower t fe into the japan basin bottom water 2 the particulate fe removal by particle scavenging during the bottom water circulation of the japan basin or 3 the injection of deep water with the higher t fe into the japan basin deep water on the other hand the t fe in deep water of the yamato basin and the slope regions were variable with different t fe levels among stations and depths we found a significant relationship between t fe and water transmittance in deep water probably resulting from the iron supply into the deep water because of the lateral transport of resuspended sediment from the slope

observations of the structure of turbulent mixing across the kuroshio 1 the mean structure of turbulence intensity across the kuroshio in spring is presented by compositing microstructure profiles on a stream coordinate the composite mean of turbulent energy dissipation rate e was high near fronts on both cyclonic and anticyclonic sides on the cyclonic side e 10 8 w kg 1 vertical diffusivity of 3 10 5 m2 s 1 was observed in the region of strong vertical shear of geostrophic velocity depth averaged e within the depth range 50 150 m 150 250 m was significantly higher at 0 to 50 km 25 to 50 km compared with 50 km from the axis although lower than on the cyclonic side e at depths of 50 150 m on the anticyclonic side near the front was again enhanced on this side the total vertical shear of horizontal velocity was strong whereas the geostrophic shear was weak

maximum extent and dynamic behaviour of the last british irish ice sheet west of ireland a complete reconstruction of the last british irish ice sheet biis is hindered by uncertainty surrounding its offshore extent and dynamic behaviour this study addresses this problem by reconstructing the depositional history of four sediment cores taken from a series of sinuous glacigenic sediment ridges on the continental shelf west of ireland we present new geomorphic sedimentary and micropaleontological data that record a maximum westward biis extent that was at least 80 km farther offshore from any previous estimates the data suggests that a large ice shelf formed over parts of the shelf prior to retreat this new data increases the areal extent of grounded biis ice by 6700 km2 from previous estimates which represents a 3 increase in the irish sector of the ice sheet three new ams radiocarbon dates demonstrate for the first time that the biis advanced to the shelf edge during last glaciation late midlandian late devensian with ice advance onto the porcupine bank occurring after 24 720 260 yr cal bp deglaciation was complete by 19 182 155 yr cal bp thus constraining biis occupation over the porcupine bank to less than 5500 years estimated retreat rates of marine terminating ice across the shelf range from 70 to 180 myr 1

chemical characterization of ambient aerosol collected during the southwest monsoon and intermonsoon seasons over the arabian sea labile fe ii and other trace metals atmospheric deposition of iron fe to certain regions of the oceans is an important nutrient source of fe to the biota and the ability of the biota to uptake fe is dependent on the speciation of the fe therefore understanding the speciation of fe in the atmosphere is critical to understanding the role of fe as a nutrient source in surface ocean waters labile ferrous iron fe ii concentrations as well as total concentrations for fe and other important trace metals cations and anions were determined over the arabian sea for two nonconsecutive months during 1995 ambient aerosol samples were collected during the indian ocean intermonsoon and southwest monsoon seasons over the arabian sea sampling took place aboard the german research vessel meteor in the months of may leg m32 3 intermonsoon and july august leg m32 5 southwest monsoon both cruise tracks followed the 65th east meridian traveling for 30 days each from north to south during leg m32 3 and from south to north during leg m32 5 a high volume dichotomous virtual impactor with an aerodynamic cutoff size of 3 m was used to collect the fine and coarse aerosol fractions for metal analysis a low volume collector was used to collect aerosol samples for anion and cation analysis the analysis for labile fe ii was done immediately after sample collection to minimize any possible fe redox reactions which might occur during sample storage the analytical procedure involved filter extraction in a formate formic acid buffered solution at ph 4 2 followed by colorimetric quantification of soluble fe ii metals anions and cations were analyzed after the cruise total atmospheric aqueous labile fe ii concentrations during the intermonsoon were between 4 75 and 80 was present in the fine fraction 3 0 m during the southwest monsoon atmospheric aqueous labile fe ii concentrations were consistently below the detection limit 0 34 to 0 089 ng m 3 depending on the volume of air sampled air mass back trajectories 5 day three dimensional showed that air masses sampled during the southwest monsoon had advected over the open indian ocean while air masses sampled during the intermonsoon had advected over northeast africa the saudi arabian peninsula and southern asia these calculations were consistent with the results of the statistical analysis performed on the data set which showed that the variance due to crustal species during the intermonsoon samples was greater than the variance due to crustal species during the southwest monsoon the factor scores for the crustal components were also greater when the back trajectories had advected over the nearby continental masses principal component analysis was also performed with the intermonsoon samples where aqueous labile fe ii was above the detection limit aqueous labile fe ii did not correlate well with other species indicating possible atmospheric processing of the iron during advection

atmospheric transport of iron and its deposition in the ocean the atmospheric transport of continental weathering products is responsible for much of the mineral material and fe entering the open ocean and is probably the dominant source of nutrient fe in the photic zone in regions where other nutrients are present in high concentrations the flux of fe from the atmosphere may be a limiting factor in primary productivity due to the larger source regions for dust north of the equator 8 times more atmospheric fe is deposited in the northern hemisphere than in the southern hemisphere the mineral aerosol and fe transport and deposition are highly variable due to the episodic nature of dust generation and its transport and deposition processes between 10 and 50 of the total atmospheric fe entering the world ocean appears to dissolve i e it will pass through a 0 4 m pore size filter rapidly when the mineral matter enters the ocean much of the atmospheric fe is present as fe ii apparently produced as a result of photochemical reduction reactions taking place during atmospheric transport this readily soluble fe ii should be available immediately for use as a nutrient by phytoplankton atmospheric transport from the continents is estimated to supply 3 times as much dissolved fe to the oceans as that delivered via rivers

carbonate mound development at the sw rockall trough margin based on high resolution tobi and seismic recording abstract in 2002 high resolution sidescan sonar images of a mound area at the sw rockall trough margin were recorded with the tobi deep towed sidescan sonar processed tobi images with a pixel resolution of 6 m provide a unique overview of the carbonate mound distribution and related sedimentary features around the mounds three morphologically distinct areas can be recognised on the tobi mosaic in area i between 500 and 600 m water depth upslope of the mounds giant sediment waves are found with wavelengths up to 500 m with wave crests of more than 10 km long and with an amplitude of up to 30 m reflected with a high backscatter on the tobi image area ii between 600 and 1000 m water depth along the upper margin flank is characterised by clustered and isolated carbonate mounds forming elongated ridges with an orientation perpendicular to the slope sedimentary structures such as flow ridges sediment waves local scouring at the foot of some mounds and draping of sediment around mounds indicate the influence of strong near bed currents oriented in two main current directions parallel to the margin as well as in a similar direction as the mound clusters the mound clusters are several kilometres long can be over 380 m high and are dissected by downslope directed channels on the tobi image the mounds appear as regions of high backscatter caused by the presence of cold water coral colonies on the sediment and by distinct shadows all mounds have their tops at a specific depth level 500 600 m water depth area iii between 900 and 1200 m water depth below the mounds is characterised by disturbed sediments with distinct slump scars and flow ridges 2d high resolution seismic profiling perpendicular and parallel to the slope across the mounds does in general not reveal strong internal reflectors within the mounds in contrast three strong reflectors can be observed in the sedimentary sequence underneath the mounds the upper reflector c10 of early pliocene age is an erosional unconformity above which most of the mounds and sediment waves seem to have developed the second erosional unconformity c20 of middle miocene age is formed by an apparent irregular surface that locally is dissected by some small faults reflectors c10 and c20 have been found in two different mound clusters in the mound area indicating that mound development possibly started after formation of reflector c20 the third reflector forms the acoustic basement which is locally dissected by some small faults that are located below the mounds at least two stages of mound formation are recognised on the seismic profiles

sediment accumulation on a cold water carbonate mound at the southwest rockall trough margin abstract cold water corals build isolated and clustered carbonate mound ridges several kilometres long and wide and up to 380 m high at the southwest rockall trough margin photo and video observations as well as coring have shown that mainly the upper mound flanks and summits are covered with a thriving living coral cover and associated fauna box cores prove the presence of living coral colonies on top of a thick layer of coral debris which is to a large extent abraded and bio eroded before being buried the coral framework is filled with sediment from settling pelagic material and parts of the fauna living at the mounds resulting in a 120 cm thick layer of sediments since 10 800 yr component analysis of a piston core from the top of a carbonate mound shows a complete record of cold water coral mound facies comprising many different species living at the mounds an alternation of skeletal and cement dominated intervals was distinguished in the piston core stable isotope analysis of planktonic and benthic foraminifera indicates a continuous sedimentation pattern since the younger dryas the deeper and older part of the core showing mainly intermediate isotope values is dominated by the presence of large hiatuses spanning a total of up to 200 000 yr hiatuses in the core may reflect periods of non deposition or erosion which may be linked to glacial interglacial variability environmental conditions probably change at glacial interglacial timescales influencing the local hydrodynamic regime food supply and sedimentation rate around the carbonate mounds affecting coral growth and therefore carbonate mound development

latest pliocene through holocene paleoceanography of the eastern indian ocean benthic foraminiferal evidence multivariate analyses of latest pliocene through holocene benthic foraminifera from 61 samples from deep sea drilling project dsdp site 214 eastern indian ocean were carried out the 46 highest ranked species were used in r mode factor analysis which has enabled to the identification of three environmentally significant assemblages at site 214 assemblage 1 is characterized by uvigerina hispido costata osangularia culter gavelinopsis lobatulus cibicides wuellerstorfi and karreriella baccata as principal species this assemblage is inferred to reflect high energy well oxygenated and probably low organic carbon deep sea environment at site 214 assemblage 2 is defined principally by globocassidulina pacifica and u proboscidea and is considered to indicate an organic carbon rich environment which resulted from high surface productivity irrespective of dissolved oxygen content assemblage 3 is marked by oridorsalis umbonatus textularia lythostrota hoeglundina elegans pyrgo murrhina and pullenia quinqueloba as principal species this assemblage is inferred to indicate a low organic carbon environment with high pore water oxygen concentration leading to better preservation of deep sea sediments

structure and development of giant carbonate mounds at the sw and se rockall trough margins ne atlantic ocean abstract high resolution seismic reflection profiling carried out in 1997 1999 showed that giant carbonate mounds occur between 500 and 1200 m water depth along both the se and sw margins of rockall trough the mounds rise 5 300 m above the surrounding seafloor and have diameters at their bases of up to 5 km buried mounds at relatively shallow depths below the seafloor are also found both individual and complex clusters of mounds can be recognized smaller and individual sometimes buried mounds are found at the upper slope on the sw rockall trough margin higher steeper and individual mounds are found deeper downslope 900 1100 m at the middle slope the mounds merge into a complex structure and form complex clusters with a very irregular upper surface and an apparent lack of internal reflectors 600 1000 m depth initial results of high resolution 3d seismic profiling at 30 m line spacing in august 2000 in two boxes of 750 m 14 5 km covering a small central part of the sw rockall trough mound area indicate two stages of mound development here the latest probably of pliocene holocene age this age based on the presence of a regionally recognizable unconformity below the mounds is also assumed for the mounds of the se rockall trough porcupine bank margin

eastern north atlantic deep sea corals tracing upper intermediate water δ14c during the holocene abstract paired 230th u and 14c dating were performed on deep sea corals lophelia pertusa and madrepora oculata from the northeastern north atlantic at 730 m bsl to investigate past changes of the thermohaline circulation these were estimated using the 14c value of the upper intermediate waters based on the 14c ages of the top and base of each coral where possible and the 230th u dating the reliability of these estimates was checked by dating two very young corals of the species l pertusa one of these corals collected alive in 1999 ad gave a 230th u age of 1995 4 ad after correction for non radiogenic 230th another coral the top of which dated to 1969 6 ad recorded the atmospheric 14c 12c increase due to the nuclear tests in the early 1960s the calculated 14c values from these two corals agree with those measured at geosecs station 23 in 1972 1973 ostlund et al earth planet sci lett 23 1974 69 86 and 1991 1992 nydal and gisfelos radiocarbon 38 1996 389 406 this together with the 100 aragonite content and the 234u and 230th 232th values of all the dated corals indicates that none of the corals behaved as open systems with respect to their u series nuclides and that they closely represent the water mass properties in which they lived the pre anthropogenic 14c value of the north atlantic intermediate waters was estimated at 69 4 the reservoir age varies from 400 years to 600 years and this variation is due to atmospheric 14c 12c changes a reservoir age of 610 80 years close to the pre anthropogenic value was determined from one coral dated at 10 430 120 cal yr bp when the global sea level was approximately at 35 m bard et al nature 382 1996 241 244 this suggests a modern like pattern of the oceanic circulation prevailed in the northeast atlantic ocean at this time although the deglaciation was not completely achieved

comparison of laser grain size analysis with pipette and sieve analysis a solution for the underestimation of the clay fraction classically the grain size of soil and sediment samples is determined by the sieve method for the coarse fractions and by the pipette method based on the stokes sedimentation rates for the fine fractions results from the two methods are compared with results from laser diffraction size analysis which is based on the forward scattering of monochromatic coherent light from a point of view of laboratory efficiency the laser sizing technique is far superior accuracy and reproducibility are shown by measurements on certified materials it appears that laser grain size measurements of certified materials correspond very well with the certificated measurements tests were also done on a set of randomly selected sediments of fluvial aeolian and lacustrine origin except for the 2 m clay fraction there is a coarsening of the mean diameter of one to two size classes 0 25 caused by the non sphericity of the particles the platy form of the clay particles induces considerable differences eight size classes between pipette and laser measurements the 2 m grain size defined by the pipette method corresponds with a grain size of 8 m defined by the laser particle sizer for the studied sediments using a higher grain size level for the clay fraction when laser analysis is applied enables workers in the geological and environmental field to compare classical pipette analysis with a laser sizing technique

growth and demise of cold water coral ecosystems on mud volcanoes in the west alboran sea the messages from the planktonic and benthic foraminifera the dhaka and maya mud volcanoes mvs located in the mud diapir province in the western alboran basin along the moroccan coasts were cored during the ttr 17 leg 1 cruise cores were taken on the top of the volcanoes at a water depth of 370 m on the dhaka mv core ttr17 ms411g and at 410 m water depth on the maya mv core ttr17 ms419g respectively on both mud volcanoes the extruded mud breccia provides the nucleation point for the colonization and development of cold water corals and associated ecosystems two phases of cold water coral growth are observed 1 between slightly older than 4175 62 years bp and around 2230 59 years bp at dhaka and 2 between slightly older than 15583 185 years bp and around 7613 38 years bp at maya mv on the top of the maya mv only a small patch reef and or isolated corals proliferated whereas a more extended patch reef colonized the top of the dhaka mv at both sites the cold water coral developmentwas triggered by the availability of a suitable substrate for initial coral settling provided either as a firm ground or as single clasts subsequently coral growth was supported by enhanced nutrient flux possibly related to upwelling and or strong currents during the intervals of coral growth planktonic foraminiferal assemblages were dominated by neogloboquadrina incompta the decline of coral ecosystems on the mud volcanoes is accompanied at surface by a shift fromthe n incompta dominated assemblage to a globorotalia inflata dominated assemblage possibly reflecting more oligotrophic conditions this shift is coeval to the passage from wet to arid conditions at the end of the african humid period at mayamv it is interpreted as an effect of an early human impact on a fragile environment which was already stressed by desiccation at the time of the development of complex human society along the mediterranean coasts at dhaka mv

biogeochemical implications of increased mineral particle concentrations in surface waters of the northwestern north pacific during an asian dust event 1 simultaneous observations were made in the marine atmospheric boundary layer and surface ocean during spring 2007 to investigate potential impacts of asian dust on a semi pelagic region of the northwestern north pacific the results suggest that mineral dust aerosols were scavenged by sea fog and their deposition to the ocean increased the particle concentration in surface seawater the atmospheric input of mineral dust to the ocean surface from this event was calculated to be 40 to 680 mg m 2 event 1 a general relationship for the solubility of iron from dust particles led to an estimate of 20 to 330 g m 2 for the amount of bio available iron delivered during the dust event this input of bio available iron is comparable to total dissolved iron added during an iron fertilization experiment in the northwestern north pacific in which an enhancement of primary production was observed

vorticity and vertical circulation at an ocean front abstract density and velocity data with 4 km horizontal resolution from a survey of a front during fasinex frontal air sea interaction experiment are combined to describe the structure of the top 300 m of the ocean the geostrophic velocity field is derived and is used to examine the relative importance of stratification relative vorticity and twisting terms in ertel s potential vorticity q tenfold isopycnic changes in q are found across a horizontal scale of only 10 km these changes are confined to isopycnals that outcrop from the seasonal thermocline into the mixed layer the ageostrophic velocity field is quantified by solution of the omega equation and vertical velocities of up to 40 m day 1 are found small 40 km surface trapped top 200 m eddies are found to play a crucial role in the transport and effective diffusion of properties across the thermocline out of the mixed layer

downwelling and deep water bottom currents as food supply mechanisms to the cold water coral lophelia pertusa scleractinia at the mingulay reef complex in 2006 and 2007 multiple deployments of current meters and optical sensors on landers and moorings were made in the first detailed in situ study of the particle supply to the coral community in the mingulay reef complex in the sea of hebrides at 140 m water depth two distinct and predictable supply mechanisms were resolved one mechanism consisted of the rapid downwelling of surface water caused by hydraulic control of tidal flow that transports particles from the surface to the corals in less than an hour the rapid downwelling was recorded on the reef top as a pulse of warm fluorescent and relatively clear water at the onset of the flood and ebb tides the pulse was strongest after flood tide and lasted for up to 3 h the second mechanism consisted of advection onto the reef of deep bottom water with a high suspended matter load this advection occurred during peak tides and was combined with topographical current acceleration on the reef top enhancing delivery of particles to the corals

mesoscale to submesoscale transition in the california current system part i flow structure eddy flux and observational tests in computational simulations of an idealized subtropical eastern boundary upwelling current system similar to the california current a submesoscale transition occurs in the eddy variability as the horizontal grid scale is reduced to o 1 km this first paper in a series of three describes the transition in terms of the emergent flow structure and the associated time averaged eddy fluxes in addition to the mesoscale eddies that arise from a primary instability of the alongshore wind driven currents significant energy is transferred into submesoscale fronts and vortices in the upper ocean the submesoscale arises through surface frontogenesis growing off upwelled cold filaments that are pulled offshore and strained in between the mesoscale eddy centers in turn some submesoscale fronts become unstable and develop submesoscale meanders and fragment into roll up vortices associated with this phenomenon are a large vertical vorticity and rossby number a large vertical velocity relatively flat horizontal spectra contrary to the prevailing view of mesoscale dynamics a large vertical buoyancy flux acting to restratify the upper ocean a submesoscale energy conversion from potential to kinetic a significant spatial and temporal intermittency in the upper ocean and material exchanges between the surface boundary layer and pycnocline comparison with available observations indicates that submesoscale fronts and instabilities occur widely in the upper ocean with characteristics similar to the simulations

elevated mixing at a front 1 the mesoscale submesoscale and microscale structure of a front in the california current was observed using a towed vehicle outfitted with microconductivity sensors thirteen 60 km cross front sections from 0 to 350 m in depth were covered in 3 5 days objectively mapped data are fit via the omega equation to obtain vertical velocity a composite cross front section shows elevated mixing on the dense side within 10 20 km of the front water downwells and gradients are elevated there i e rossby number ro horizontal strain spice gradients and microscale thermal dissipation thermal eddy diffusivity kt reaches 10 3 m2 s 1 and increases 3 10 from the anticyclonic to the cyclonic side with a depth mean of 10 4 m2 s 1 the spatial structure of kt ro and are similar on the dense side suggesting an energy cascade from the mesoscale via the submesoscale to the microscale however it is unclear whether frontogenesis internal wave blocking by elevated vorticity or internal wave trapping by large produces the elevated mixing the mean turbulent heat flux opposes the mean restratifying mesoscale heat flux of 10 w m 2 and may allow the front to persist turbulent nitrate fluxes are 0 1 0 3 mmol m 2 s 1 chlorophyll fluorescence and beam transmission reveal a 6 km wide 100 km long alongfront streamer which is a deep biomass maximum time scales for mixing and nutrient fluxes are 0 3 3 days which are similar to phytoplankton growth rates and the time scale for frontal evolution

simulation of high concentration of iron in dense shelf water in the okhotsk sea abstract an ocean general circulation model coupled with a simple biogeochemical model was developed to simulate iron circulation in and around the sea of okhotsk the model has two external sources of iron dust iron at the sea surface and sedimentary iron at the seabed shallower than 300 m the model represented characteristic features reasonably well such as high iron concentration in the dense shelf water dsw and its mixing which extends southward in the intermediate layer from the northwestern shelf along sakhalin island and finally flows into the pacific sensitivity experiments for the solubility of dust iron in seawater suggest that a solubility of 1 is appropriate in our simulation higher solubilities 5 and 10 result in too low phosphate in the northwestern north pacific in summer as well as too high iron concentrations at the sea surface compared with observations besides these experiments show that dust iron hardly contributes to the high iron concentration in the intermediate layer to investigate locations from which the iron in the intermediate layer originates the fate of sedimentary iron input from four regions in the okhotsk sea was examined results suggest that the western and central parts of the northern shelf are important

soil abrasion and eolian dust production implications for iron partitioning and solubility 1 eolian dust is a source of iron for phytoplankton in many ocean areas and there are complex pathways of atmospheric processing from soil to ocean overlooked parts of the pathways are the impact of large 10 m grains including a role as proxies for the behavior of smaller grains and the effect of multiple cycles of uplift and abrasion in the dust source region partitioning readily released acid leachable and refractory and dissolution rates of iron were determined for an artificial dust produced by abrading an australian soil untreated soil abraded soil after production of the artificial dust and a natural australian eolian dust sample taken during a dust storm readily released iron is not created during abrasion and therefore the amount of readily released iron in a dust or dust derived soil depends on processing events since the dust or soil last experienced an abrasion event our study develops a method for the partitioning of iron within airborne dusts and appears to be the first to consider the effect of multiple uplift events on iron partitioning

recent sediment transport and deposition in the nazare canyon portuguese continental margin processes pathways and fluxes of sediment transport and deposition in the nazare submarine canyon portuguese continental margin were investigated by water column profiling of suspended particulate matter recording of near bottom currents and suspended particulate matter fluxes with benthic landers and by analysis of surface sediment cores the results show that fine grained suspended sediment from the adjacent shelf is captured in the upper canyon and actively transported through the canyon to the abyssal plain under influence of tidal currents and intermittent sediment gravity flows tidal currents are actively resuspending and transporting sediment in the upper to middle canyon as reflected by high concentration of suspended particles in bottom waters high horizontal and vertical sediment fluxes in the bottom water layer and high sediment accumulation rate on the seabed diminishing strength of tidal currents leads to focussed sediment deposition in the middle canyon further transport of sediments toward the lower canyon takes place predominantly by sediment gravity flows occurring on yearly or longer timescale turbidity currents strong enough to transport sand sized material to the lower canyon occur only on centennial or longer timescales

environmental changes and growth history of a cold water carbonate mound propeller mound porcupine seabight on and off mound sediment cores from propeller mound hovland mound province porcupine seabight were analysed to understand better the evolution of a carbonate mound the evaluation of benthic foraminiferal assemblages from the off mound position helps to determine the changes of the environmental controls on propeller mound in glacial and interglacial times two different assemblages describe the holocene and marine isotope stage mis 2 and late mis 3 31 kyr bp the different assemblages are related to changes in oceanographic conditions surface productivity and the waxing and waning of the british irish ice sheet biis during the last glacial stages the interglacial assemblage is related to a higher supply of organic material and stronger current intensities in water depth of recent coral growth during the last glaciation the benthic faunas showed high abundances of cassidulinid species implying cold bottom waters and a reduced availability of organic matter high sedimentation rates and the domination of elphidium excavatum point to shelf erosion related to sea level lowering 50 m and the progradation of the biis onto the shelf a different assemblage described for the on mound core is dominated by discanomalina coronata gavelinopsis translucens planulina ariminensis cibicides lobatulus and to a lower degree by hyrrokkin sarcophaga these species are only found or show significantly higher relative abundances in on mound samples and their maximum contribution in the lower part of the record indicates a higher coral growth density on propeller mound in an earlier period they are less abundant during the holocene however this dataset portrays the boundary conditions of the habitable range for the cold water coral lophelia pertusa which dominates the deep water reefal ecosystem on the upper flanks of propeller mound the growth of this ecosystem occurs during interglacial and interstadial periods whereas a retreat of corals is documented in the absence of glacial sediments on mound glacial conditions with cold intermediate waters a weak current regime and high sedimentation rates provide an unfavourable environmental setting for lophelia corals to grow a late pleistocene decrease is observed in the mound growth for propeller mound which might face its complete burial in the future as it already happened to the buried mounds of the magellan mound province further north

deep marine seabed erosion and gravel lags in the northwestern rockall trough north atlantic ocean a zone of active seabed erosion has been identified in the northwestern rockall trough using seismic reflection profiles and cores the region from george bligh bank to rockall bank has been subject to vigorous bottom current activity for at least the last 35 ma bottom currents originate from southward flowing north atlantic deep water in water depths of 500 2000 m acoustic character mapping reveals a zone of erosion extending over 8500 km 2 along the northwestern margins of the trough the erosion surface is characterized by an acoustically reflective seabed with occasional parallel to transparent reflectors these are the result of strong bottom currents exposing the underlying volcanic basement drift sequences and fan sediments the erosion surface is covered by a

validation of accumulation rates in teluk banten indonesia from commonly applied 210pb models using the 1883 krakatau tephra as time marker abstract teluk banten is a tropical shallow marine embayment on the north coast of java close to the krakatau volcanic complex the tsunami generated by the 1883 krakatau eruption resulted in the deposition of a tsunamite tephra layer on the bottom of teluk banten the krakatau event layer has been used as a time marker to validate 210 pb geochronological dating models this validation was performed to answer the question why should we believe excess 210 pb derived mass accumulation rates the commonly used models have therefore been applied to 210 pb activity profiles from 25 gravity cores models that have been validated are the constant flux and constant sedimentation cf cs with and without a surface mixed layer the constant initial concentration cic the constant rate of supply crs and the flux balance model after comparison of the mass accumulation rates mars of the different models with the mars obtained from the krakatau layer the following could be concluded firstly activity profiles without a surface mixed layer gave cf cs mars which were on average a factor 1 4 0 3 n 8 too high including a mixing rate of 0 5 0 4 cm 2 yr 1 into the model could explain this overestimation secondly for 210 pb activity profiles with a surface mixed layer the mars were in good comparison 1 0 0 3 n 12 with the mars derived from the krakatau event layer thirdly increased accumulation instead of reworking had to be the main cause of the comparatively thick upper layer of five cores with very high inventories fourthly assuming a variable accumulation rate and applying the cic model and crs model for these five cores the weighted average cic mars were in general more accurate than the crs mar finally the flux balance model which is not often used gave mars that were a factor 1 3 0 2 n 25 too high the advantage of this model is that it is independent of the profile shape the disadvantage is that a reliable and accurate initial activity over longer time scales has to be obtained

oceanic iron supply mechanisms which support the spring diatom bloom in the oyashio region western subarctic pacific 1 multiyear 2003 2008 time series observations along the a line provided information on the temporal variability of the dissolved iron diss fe concentration in the oyashio region of the western subarctic pacific and the data indicated that there was an annual cycle in the concentration of surface diss fe occurring every year diss fe was supplied into the surface water in this region every winter and supports the spring phytoplankton bloom after development of the thermocline the diss fe concentration was drawn down during the phytoplankton bloom period and was depleted in summer in some water masses then diss fe increased from autumn to winter with the increasing depth of the surface mixed layer the high diss fe concentrations in the surface layer in winter were controlled by mesoscale oceanic intrinsic processes such as vertical winter mixing and horizontal fe rich intermediate water transport difference in magnitude of the winter mixing processes among different water masses caused the heterogeneous distribution of diss fe concentration in the surface layer moreover the vertical section profiles along a cross oyashio transect showed the occurrence of fe rich intermediate water and upward transport of materials from the intermediate water to the surface layer via tidal and winter mixing processes are important mechanisms to explain the high winter surface diss fe concentrations additionally the substantially higher diss fe no3 ratio in the winter surface layer in this studied area other than the high nutrient low chlorophyll region indicates that the winter surface water in the oyashio and the oyashio kuroshio transition zone has a high potential to stimulate phytoplankton growth

sedimentology and chronology of the advance and retreat of the last british irish ice sheet on the continental shelf west of ireland the last british irish ice sheet biis had extensive marine terminating margins and was drained by multiple large ice streams and is thus a useful analogue for marine based areas of modern ice sheets however despite recent advances from investigating the offshore record of the biis the dynamic history of its marine margins which would have been sensitive to external forcing s remain inadequately understood this study is the first reconstruction of the retreat dynamics and chronology of the western marine terminating margin of the last late midlandian biis analyses of shelf geomorphology and core sedimentology and chronology enable a reconstruction of the late midlandian history of the biis west of ireland from initial advance to final retreat onshore five ams radiocarbon dates from marine cores constrain the timing of retreat and associated readvances during deglaciation the biis advanced without streaming or surging depositing a bed of highly consolidated subglacial traction till and reached to within 20 km of the shelf break by 24 000 cal bp ice margin retreat was likely preceded by thinning grounding zone retreat and ice shelf formation on the outer shelf by 22 000 cal bp this ice shelf persisted for 2500 years while retreating at a minimum rate of 24 m yr and buttressing a 150 km long 20 km wide bathymetrically controlled grounding zone a large 150 km long arcuate flat topped grounding zone wedge termed here the galway lobe grounding zone wedge glgzw was deposited below this ice shelf and records a significant stillstand in biis retreat geomorphic relationships indicate that the biis experienced continued thinning during its retreat across the shelf which led to increased topographic influence on its flow dynamics following ice shelf break up and grounding zone retreat past the glgzw at this stage of retreat the western biis was comprised of several discrete asynchronous lobes that underwent several readvances sedimentary evidence of dilatant till deposition suggests that the readvances may have been rapid and possibly associated with ice streaming or surging the largest lobe extended offshore from galway bay and deposited the galway lobe readvance moraine by 18 500 cal bp further to the north an ice lobe readvanced at least 50 km offshore from killary harbour possibly by 15 100 cal bp the existing chronology currently does not allow us to determine conclusively whether these readvances were a glaciodynamic internally driven response of the ice sheet during deglaciation or were climatically driven following the 18 500 cal bp readvance the galway lobe experienced accelerated eastward retreat at an estimated rate of 113 m yr

diagenetic processes in carbonate mound sediments at the south west rockall trough margin cold water coral covered carbonate mounds at the south west margin of the rockall trough form ridges several kilometres long and up to 380 m high piston cores obtained at three mound crests reveal the complex internal structure of the mound build up with alternating unlithified coral dominated intervals and lithified intervals the most recent lithified interval is covered by corals embedded in a fine grained matrix comprising ca 11 000 years of continuous mound evolution before this time 230th u dating shows the presence of several hiatuses in mound build up aragonitic coral material is absent or only present as mouldic porosity in the lithified intervals and coccoliths display widespread overgrowth downcore x ray fluorescence scanning computer tomography scan images and petrographic observations indicate different degrees of diagenetic alteration the upper boundary of the most recent lithified interval shows some erosional features but petrographic observations indicate that initial lithification of the sediments is not related to this erosive event or to long term non sedimentation but to earlier sub surface diagenesis organic matter oxidation and the subsequent lowering of the saturation state of the carbonate system drives dissolution of the unstable aragonitic coral skeletons depending on the openness of the system this can lead to precipitation of a more stable low magnesium carbonate a model is presented describing the sedimentary and diagenetic processes leading to the formation of lithified intervals

size dependence of iron solubility of asian mineral dust particles 1 asian mineral dust was sampled at hokkaido northern japan in spring 2004 and 2006 iron solubility of the bulk aerosol the size segregated aerosol 0 45 4 7 m we suggest that an iron solubility of around 0 4 is typical for asian mineral dust of large particles transported to hokkaido in the high nutrient low chlorophyll region of the western subarctic north pacific near the asian continent where the mineral dust deposition is dominated by large particles the iron solubility of the mineral dust entering the ocean is around 0 4

bulk and single particle mineralogy of asian dust and a comparison with its source soils 1 the mineralogical properties of asian dust have been examined in detail and the results have been compared with the chinese source soils using high resolution scanning electron microscopy transmission electron microscopy x ray diffraction and chemical analysis mineralogical classification of asian dust particles showed that the most common single particles were clay aggregates 48 that were often mixed with nanosized calcite followed by particles of quartz 22 plagioclase 11 coarse calcite 6 k feldspar 5 muscovite chlorite kaolinite amphibole gypsum fe and ti oxides which were either partly or entirely attached with clay size mineral grains the clay minerals in asian dust were mostly illite and interstratified illite smectite the average mineral composition of the bulk dust samples by x ray diffraction was quartz 28 plagioclase 11 k feldspar 8 calcite 8 illite 19 interstratified illite smectite 22 chlorite 2 smectite 1 and kaolinite 1 in the silty soils from the source regions the clay minerals and nanosized pedogenic calcite aggregated and covered silt size minerals while the sands were mostly composed of quartz and feldspars and were lined with clay minerals the mineralogy of asian dust was similar to that of the silty soil from the loess plateau but the total phyllosilicate content increased from desert sands 7 silty soil 23 to asian dust 45 fining eastward the optical properties of asian dust and its interaction with atmospheric gases and cloud are probably affected by the clay rich mineral composition the aggregation and attachment of the clay minerals on the coarser minerals and the nanosized calcite

large scale paleoceanographic variations in the western mediterranean sea during the last 34 000 years from enhanced cold water coral growth to declining mounds abstract quantitative and qualitative analyses of cold water coral cwc fragments from two sediment cores obtained from the melilla mounds field mmf in the alboran sea western mediterranean sea reveal an alternation of periods dominated by distinct cwc species the lower parts of the cores are dominated by the cwc species lophelia pertusa which is successively replaced in the upper parts by the species madrepora oculata and dendrophyllids the transition in the macrofauna coincides with a characteristic change in the benthic foraminiferal assemblage benthic foraminiferal assemblage bfaglacial in accordance with benthic cibicides lobatulus and planktic globigerina bulloides 13c and 18o values provide evidence for generally high surface productivity cold and well ventilated bottom waters lasting from the end of marine isotope stage 3 33 3 ka bp reaching a maximum at the transition allerod younger dryas together with 13c of the organic carbon and rock eval pyrolysis benthic foraminiferal assemblage bfainterglacial established since the early holocene indicates that the mmf experienced a decrease in bottom water energy that caused an organic carbon enrichment in the sediments and also depleted oxygen waters compared to the pre holocene interval dominated by the planktic foraminifera neogloboquadrina incompta and the benthic foraminiferal assemblage bfaglacial the organic carbon deposited during the holocene in the mmf contains more refractory components in relation to sea level rise and modern oceanographic configuration based on our data we suggest that l pertusa has a higher ecological requirement than m oculata and dendrophyllids especially with regard to oxygen and nutrient availability

late glacial to holocene history of the mediterranean outflow evidence from benthic foraminiferal assemblages and stable isotopes at the portuguese margin records of benthic foraminiferal assemblage variations and benthic 13c along 12 sediment cores from the western iberian margin between 36 and 42 n at water depths from 820 to 3580 m are used to monitor fluctuations of the mediterranean outflow water mow during the past 30 ka the chronostratigraphy of the cores is based on planktonic 18o records 14c ams dating and the recognition of heinrich events h1 through h4 increased abundances of suspension feeding benthic foraminifers denoted as epibenthos group closely match areas where the recent mow core layers impinge on the continental slope at 800 and 1300 m water depth and near bottom current velocities are enhanced elevated epibenthos group abundances increased benthic 13c and sedimentological evidence for winnowing and erosion are found in glacial sections up to the earliest termination i in cores at water depths between 1600 and 2200 m off southern portugal the combined evidence reveals enhanced current activity at these depths due to a deep glacial mow the mow advection at the portuguese margin during the last glacial was about 700 m deeper than today conceivably forced by increased mow density due to higher salinity and colder temperatures of mediterranean waters the deep mow current gradually decreased in strength and shoaled to 1300 m water depth during the termination and early holocene a shallow mow core layer became active with the onset of termination i at depths between 600 and 1000 m both the shallow and deep mow current culminated during the younger dryas period the present flow pattern with two mow core layers centred at 800 and 1300 m water depth was established between 7 5 and 5 5 ka

the effect of sediment mixing on pb 210 accumulation rates for the washington continental shelf abstract nine cores from the washington continental shelf were examined by radiochemical techniques in order to evaluate the effect of mixing on the calculation of sediment accumulation rates from pb 210 profiles th 234 profiles indicate mixing coefficients of 140 cm 2 yr 1 for the seabed offshore from the columbia river and 47 cm 2 yr 1 for the seabed of the mid shelf silt deposit 75 km north of the columbia river these large mixing coefficients demonstrate that particles can penetrate to the base of the intensely mixed surface layer 10 cm within one year after emplacement at the seabed surface observed depths of cs 137 penetration within the seabed are compared with depths predicted from the surface mixed layer thickness and the pb 210 accumulation rate the observed and predicted depths agree well at all but one station at this station a combination of th 234 co 60 pb 210 and cs 137 profiles suggests that active mixing occurs below the intensely mixed surface layer the agreement of pb 210 and cs 137 data at the other stations however indicates a general absence of deep mixing on the washington shelf thus the apparent accumulation rates calculated from pb 210 profiles below the intensely mixed surface layer on the washington shelf generally reflect the true rates of sediment accumulation

the impact of the mediterranean outflow water mow on benthic foraminiferal assemblages and surface sediments at the southern portuguese continental margin benthic foraminifera and surface sediments were analyzed from 23 box core and core top samples from 250 to 3600 m depth at the southern portuguese continental margin between 37 and 38 n this area is affected by the mow which flows northwards along the slope between 600 and 1500 m waterdepth sediment structures grain size distribution and clay mineral assemblages of surface sediments indicate active winnowing in the upper part of the mow and deposition of the fine fraction near its lower boundary r mode cluster analyses of foraminiferal census data from the 250 m fraction revealed four associations the shelf edge association occurs on glauconitic shelf and upper slope sands down to 268 m the upper slope association is recognized between 498 and 1300 m where sand silt clays to clayey silts are encountered the lower slope association is found between 1405 and 2985 m and differs markedly from assemblages below 3000 m deep water association where the near surface sediments are soft hemipelagic clays the boundary layer association shows no significant depth limits but abundance maxima both in the density interface above the mow and in the interval of decreasing turbulence below it the boundaries of the shelf edge and upper slope association correspond to these hydrographic boundary layers whereas the boundary between lower slope and deep water assemblage is related to threshold values of nutrient flux to the benthic community examination of hard substrates reveals 27 different species of epibenthic foraminifera six of these the epibenthos group were found attached to elevated substrates only within the mow above the mow elevated substrates were inhabited by different species whilst below the mow they were not used by any epibenthic foraminifers evidently the hydrodynamic environment of the mow current provides an ecological niche which is efficiently used by opportunistic suspension feeders the epibenthos group is more abundant in the middle part of the study area between 37 20 and 37 40 n where the sand content of surface sediments is also higher both indicate an enhanced sediment water interaction in this area which results from an obstruction of the mow flow by the principes d avis basement spur

benthic foraminiferal assemblages from the eastern south atlantic polar front region between 35 and 57 s distribution ecology and fossilization potential abstract surface sediment samples taken with a multiple corer from the polar front region along two profiles in the eastern south atlantic sector between 35 and 57 s have been investigated for their benthic foraminiferal content live fauna was differentiated from the death assemblage based on the dead assemblages potential fossil assemblages dead fauna reduced by non resistant agglutinants were calculated for comparison with upper neogene core material the distribution of the potential fossil assemblages defined byq mode principal component analysis mirrors the recent hydrographic as well as the trophic situation in the eastern south atlantic ocean circulation and productivity two southern component bottom water faunas reflect the northward flow of antarctic bottom water aabw and lower circum polar deep water lcdw an assemblage dominated by the arenaceousmultifidella nodulosa below the calcite compensation depth ccd and anuttallides umbonifer dominated assemblage above the ccd in the region of highest bio silicious primary productivity south of the polar front and north of the winter sea ice limit these faunas are overprinted by a southern high productivity fauna dominated by infaunal species such aspullenia bulloides melonis pompilioides andm zaandamae north atlantic deep water nadw meets the circum polar deep water cdw at intermediate depth as reflected in the distribution of the northern component deep water fauna dominated byepistominella exigua the high productivity assemblage overprinting this fauna the northern high productivity fauna is dominated by the shallow endobenthicbulimina aculeata a strong bottom current fauna dominated byangulogerina angulosa characterizes areas between 400 and 900 m water depth with sandy sediment independent from water mass characteristics and food supply

grain size distribution and depositional processes of the mineral component of abyssal sediments lessons from the north pacific grain size analyses of the mineral component of abyssal pacific surface sediments show two distinctly different size distributions that can be associated with sediments that are dominantly eolian and dominantly hemipelagic respectively in the range of 1 to 30 m eolian grains show a distinct size mode at about 2 m 9 and little material coarser than about 16 m 6 hemipelagic grains are characterized by a much flatter size distribution that has a broad size mode near 2 m 9 and important amounts of material coarser than 16 m 6 this ability to distinguish between hemipelagic and eolian grains will obviate some long standing concerns in the interpretation of deep sea sediments examples of the utility of this technique are given for the north pacific and south atlantic

hydrography and through flow in the north eastern north atlantic ocean the nansen project abstract the circulation and hydrography of the north eastern north atlantic has been studied with an emphasis on the upper layers and the deep water types which take part in the thermohaline overturning of the oceanic conveyor belt over 900 hydrographic stations were used for this study mainly from the 1987 1991 period the hydrographic properties of subpolar mode water in the upper layer which is transported towards the norwegian sea showed large regional variation the deep water mass was dominated by the cold inflow of deep water from the norwegian sea and by a cyclonic recirculation of lower deep water with a high antarctic bottom water content at intermediate levels the dominating water type was labrador sea water with only minor influence of mediterranean sea water in the permanent pycnocline traces of antarctic intermediate water were found geostrophic transports have been estimated and these agreed in order of magnitude with the local heat budget with current measurements with data from surface drifters and with the observed water mass modification a total of 23 sv of surface water entered the region of which 20 sv originated from the north atlantic current while 3 sv entered via an eastern boundary current of this total 13 sv of surface water left the area across the reykjanes ridge and 7 sv entered the norwegian sea while 3 sv was entrained by the cold overflow across the iceland scotland ridge approximately 1 4 sv of norwegian sea deep water was involved in the overflow into the iceland basin which with about 1 1 sv of entrained water and 1 1 sv recirculating lower deep water formed a deep northern boundary current in the iceland basin at intermediate depths where labrador sea water formed the dominant water type about 2 sv of entrained surface water contributed to a saline water mass which was transported westwards along the south icelandic slope