Fluctuating local mobility from the end of the Pleistocene to the end of the Holocene on the north coast of New Guinea

The New Guinea Trench is a sparsely surveyed seafloor depression which runs parallel to the north coast of New Guinea for a distance of some 700 km. Its western end lies about 600 km east of the Philippine Trench; the intervening region is occupied by a complex series of north trending ridges and troughs, of which the Ayu Trough and the Tobi and Mapia ridges are the most prominent. It has been suggested and is now widely accepted that the trench marks a site of subduction, but the degree of present‐day activity is disputed. The western termination has recently been defined by combined single‐channel seismic and long range sidescan sonar surveys as lying at the ridge system which culminates in Mapia Island. The trench contains as much as 1 km of flat‐lying undisturbed sediments within the area surveyed, and the southern slopes are extensively channeled, suggesting a lack of recent deformation. The same survey has also shown that for a distance of some 400 km west of the western end of the trench, the north coast of New Guinea is flanked, at a distance of only a few tens of kilometers, by a deep trough. The sonar imagery of this “Manokwari Trough” suggests recent convergence as well as transcurrent movement. Both the existence of this trough and the abrupt termination of the New Guinea Trench are consequences of the seafloor spreading which took place in the Ayu Trough after subduction had ceased at the trench.

Skou, a language of the central north coast of New Guinea, presents a rare example of multiple exponence of features in the agreement paradigms for subject. While this is a challenge for theories of morphology, because each morphological realization presents exactly the same featural information in Skou, there is a simple historical explanation for the modern complexities, involving cycles of cliticization. After the initial impetus toward developing an agreement system, the subsequent cycles were probably inspired by the progressive loss of differentiation in the inflected verb form due to sound changes in the language that simplified clusters and collapsed contrasts. This account allows us to understand many of the irregularities in Skou agreement.

Skou, a language of the central north coast of New Guinea, presents a rare example of multiple exponence of features in the agreement paradigms for subject. While this is a challenge for theories of morphology, because each morphological realization presents exactly the same featural information in Skou, there is a simple historical explanation for the modern complexities, involving cycles of cliticization. After the initial impetus toward developing an agreement system, the subsequent cycles were probably inspired by the progressive loss of differentiation in the inflected verb form due to sound changes in the language that simplified clusters and collapsed contrasts. This account allows us to understand many of the irregularities in Skou agreement.

Welsch et al. (1992) study the frequency of occurrence of 47 artifact types across 31 villages on the North Coast of New Guinea. They find variation in assemblages of material culture to be associated with geographic propinquity only, with linguistic relations having virtually no effect. Our reanalysis, which suggests that language and propinquity have equally strong effects, has important theoretical implications for the study of culture, past and present. In addition, we present a new analysis of the differential distribution of material artifacts among village sites.

Statistical analysis of variability in assemblages of material culture obtained at different villages on the North Coast of New Guinea indicates that similarities and differences among these assemblages are most strongly associated with geographic propinquity, irrespective of linguistic affinities. When assemblage similarity is adjusted for the effect of distance, diversity in material culture appears unrelated to the linguistic relationships of these communities. This study shows that similarity in material culture assemblages can mask marked heterogeneity in language. Language, however, is frequently used to index people in Melanesia on the assumption that language is a useful key to their other human characteristics. This analysis does not lend support to this common practice, and it has implications for how prehistoric cultural complexes in Melanesia are defined and interpreted.

The South Equatorial Counter Current (SECC) strongly influences the American Samoa Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) and changes strength on a seasonal and ENSO cycle. A strong SECC is associated with a predominantly anticyclonic eddy field as well as increased micronekton biomass and catch‐per‐unit‐effort (CPUE) for albacore tuna, the economically important target species of the local longline fishery. A strong SECC carries chlorophyll a‐rich waters from upwelling regions at the north coast of New Guinea towards the EEZ, most likely resulting in the observed increase in micronekton biomass, forage for albacore. Relatively stable anticyclonic eddies show a further increase in micronekton biomass, apparently advected from neighboring SECC waters. The presence of forage presumably concentrates albacore, thus resulting in the observed increase in CPUE. High shear regions of neither anticyclonic nor cyclonic eddies correlate with increased micronekton biomass. Areas characterized by South Equatorial Current (SEC) waters correspond to areas with the lowest micronekton biomass and the highest number of aggregative structures, which are most likely small pelagic fish shoals. Micronekton composition in SEC waters differs from that in the SECC. During El Niños, the seasonal signals at the north shore of New Guinea and in the SECC are exceptionally strong and correspond to higher albacore CPUE in the EEZ. My results suggest that the strength of upwelling and the resulting increase in chlorophyll a at New Guinea, as well as the Southern Oscillation Index, could be used to predict the performance of the local longline fishery for albacore tuna in the American Samoa EEZ.

Stretches of deep ocean constitute barriers to the dispersal of many shallow-water marine species in the tropical Pacific. The purpose of this study was to assess the selectivity of these barriers with respect to the habitat characteristics, adult size, and predation-related shell architecture of gastropods, and to explore the implications of this selectivity for macroevolutionary patterns of extinction and speciation. The dispersal barrier between continental islands (represented in my collections by species from eastern Indonesia, the southern Philippines, and the north coast of New Guinea) and the nearby oceanic Palau Islands was studied by evaluating the percentage of each architectural and habitat category that is present on the continental islands but missing in Palau. The barrier is significantly more effective against sand-dwelling species than against rock-dwellers, and among rock-dwellers it is most effective against aperturally unarmored taxa. Barriers between Palau and Guam, Guam and the Hawaiian Islands, and the Line Islands and the tropical Eastern Pacific are generally unselective with respect to substratum type and architecture. The fact that narrow-apertured species are less affected by the barrier between the continental islands and Palau than are other rock-dwelling gastropods is consistent with the interpretation that this group has been unusually resistant to extinction and highly susceptible to founder speciation when oceanic circulation is altered. These patterns of susceptibility and geographical distribution may explain why armored gastropods have increased in numbers relative to unarmored ones in the tropical Pacific during the Cenozoic.

Research Article| January 01, 1965 Submarine Geology North of New Guinea DALE C KRAUSE DALE C KRAUSE Graduate School of Oceanography, University of Rhode Island, Kingston, R. I. Search for other works by this author on: GSW Google Scholar Author and Article Information DALE C KRAUSE Graduate School of Oceanography, University of Rhode Island, Kingston, R. I. Publisher: Geological Society of America Received: 13 Feb 1964 First Online: 02 Mar 2017 Online ISSN: 1943-2674 Print ISSN: 0016-7606 Copyright © 1965, The Geological Society of America, Inc. Copyright is not claimed on any material prepared by U.S. government employees within the scope of their employment. GSA Bulletin (1965) 76 (1): 27–42. https://doi.org/10.1130/0016-7606(1965)76[27:SGNONG]2.0.CO;2 Article history Received: 13 Feb 1964 First Online: 02 Mar 2017 Cite View This Citation Add to Citation Manager Share Icon Share Facebook Twitter LinkedIn MailTo Tools Icon Tools Get Permissions Search Site Citation DALE C KRAUSE; Submarine Geology North of New Guinea. GSA Bulletin 1965;; 76 (1): 27–42. doi: https://doi.org/10.1130/0016-7606(1965)76[27:SGNONG]2.0.CO;2 Download citation file: Ris (Zotero) Refmanager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search All ContentBy SocietyGSA Bulletin Search Advanced Search Abstract A bathymetric chart of the sea floor north of New Guinea between 129° and 140° W. long. was constructed, based on soundings of the Recorder Expedition of August 1961 and other soundings, published and unpublished. The tectonic features of the sea floor can be correlated with features in northern New Guinea, especially: (1) a north-south deformational zone which lies north and west of Mapia Islands and links tectonic features in New Guinea to those near the Palau Islands; (2) an east-southeast trend paralleling the north coast of New Guinea; (3) east-west troughs, especially well developed near the equator; and (4) other minor trends. A major left-lateral shear zone may extend the length of New Guinea. Three major periods of deformation have been Cretaceous-Eocene, between Miocene and Pliocene, and Quaternary. The geologic history of northern New Guinea is similar to that of the Darwin Rise. This content is PDF only. Please click on the PDF icon to access. First Page Preview Close Modal You do not have access to this content, please speak to your institutional administrator if you feel you should have access.

When the sea-level was lower, Homo erectus walked into an extended Pleistocene land mass of mainland Southeast Asia. At no stage of the Pleistocene was this connected to the former continent of Greater Australia and there is no evidence yet for a water crossing beyond Wallace's Line, although the continuing mystery of Stegadons (elephantids) in Sulawesi, the Philippines, Timor and Flores suggests these islands were once more accessible than now. Homo sapiens entered the island chains of Wallacea to reach Greater Australia, and beyond to the Bismarck Archipelago and the Solomon Islands. When and how this happened, and what routes it took, have been matters of investigation, speculation and even simulation. This chapter reviews the main arguments.

MODERN biogeographic theory states that the number of species in a class or other large taxonomic unit that inhabits an island is maintained within narrow bounds by a dynamic steady state between colonization and extinction' (MacArthur and Wilson 1967). Although a recent experimental test of the theory upheld most of its expectations (Simberloff and Wilson 1969), there remains a paucity of data on natural colonization and extinction rates from which to judge the time scale of faunal turnover on islands of varying geographic status. Two previous studies of avifaunal turnover on islands have come to our attention, one involving the California Channel Islands (Diamond 1969) and the other, Karkar, a volcanic island off the north coast of New Guinea (Diamond 1971c). Here we report on changes in the birdlife of Mona Island that have transpired since the turn of the century. Mona is especially well suited for the measurement of turnover for a number of reasons: its terrestrial avifauna consists of a very limited number of species, most of which are common; its topography and vegetation are extremely uniform, making unlikely the possibility that species have escaped detection in small pockets of habitat; it is large enough (24 square miles) to provide living space for numerically ample populations, yet small enough to cover on foot from end to end; it has suffered comparatively little disturbance by man; and its avifauna has been thoroughly surveyed on several prior occasions, first in 1901. In having a fauna that is entirely composed of species found on the nearby western end of Puerto Rico, Mona also lends itself to a study of ecological release, an expansion in density, distribution, or behavior that is commonly observed when the performance of a species is recorded under high and low intensities of competition (Crowell 1961, 1962; Willis 1966; Diamond 1969, 1971a, 1971b; MacArthur et al. 1972). The presence of a gradient of habitat in Puerto Rico that extends from areas of high to low rainfall makes it possible to select a plot having almost any desired combination of structural characteristics. By comparing the censuses of matched plots, one obtains good control over at least some of the variables that potentially regulate faunal composition and density. The second part of the paper presents the results

The structure and evolution of the northern New Guinea collision zone is deduced from International Seismological Center (ISC) seismicity (1964–1985), new and previously published focal mechanisms and a reexamination of pertinent geological data. A tectonic model for the New Guinea margin is derived which illustrates the sequential stages in the collision and suturing of the Bewani‐Toricelli‐Adelbert‐Finisterre‐Huon‐New Britain arc to central New Guinea followed by subduction polarity reversal in the west. East of 149°E, the Solomon plate is being subducted both to the north and south; bringing the New Britain and Trobriand forearcs toward collision. West of 149°E the forearcs have collided, and together they override a fold in the doubly subducted Solomon plate lithosphere, which has an axis that is parallel to the strike of the Ramu‐Markham suture and that plunges westward at an angle of 5° beneath the coast ranges of northern New Guinea. Active volcanism off the north coast of New Guinea is related to subduction of the Solomon plate beneath the Bismarck plate. Active volcanism of the Papuan peninsula and Quaternary volcanism of the New Guinea highlands are related to slow subduction of the Solomon plate beneath the Indo‐Australian plate along the Trobriand Trough and the trough’s former extension to the west, respectively. From 144°–148°E, seismicity and focal mechanisms reveal that convergence between the sutured Bismarck and Indo‐Australian plates is accommodated by thrusting within the Finisterre and Adelbert ranges and compression of the New Guinea orogenic belt, together with basement‐involved foreland folding and thrusting to the south. The Finisterre block overthrusts the New Guinea orogenic belt, whereas the Adelbert block is sutured to New Guinea and overthrusts the oceanic lithosphere of the Bismarck Sea. Along the New Guinea Trench, west of 144°E, seismicity defines a southward dipping Wadati‐Benioif zone, and focal mechanisms indicate oblique subduction. Only this oldest, westernmost portion of the collision has progressed past suturing to a full reversal in subduction polarity.

Body temperature, heterothermy, oxygen consumption, heart rate, and evaporative water loss were studied in four species of flying foxes (Megachiroptera), Dobsonia minor, Nyctimene major, Nyctimene albiventer, and Paranyctimene raptor, from the vicinity of Madang on the north coast of New Guinea. The thermoregulatory response of D. minor resembled that of most other placental mammals weighing 80 to 100 g. Body temperatures were relatively stable at ambient temperatures between 5 and 34°. The mean oxygen consumption at rest between 30 and 35° was 1.26 cc O2 (g·hr)−1. At ambient temperatures between 5 and 35° evaporative water loss averaged 4.5 mg (g·hr)−1 and increased sharply at higher temperatures. When subjected to heat stress the animals panted, salivated, and licked the wings, belly, and uropatagium. At temperatures above 38° the ratio of heat lost through evaporation to heat production exceeded 1. Minimal heart rates in resting animals near thermal neutrality were approximately 275/min. In those parameters measured, N. major which weighed about 80 g resembled D. minor. Nyctimene albiventer and P. raptor weigh less than 30 g and are among the smallest of the flying foxes. Each shows both homeothermic and heterothermic patterns of response. At an ambient temperature of 35° the minimal oxygen consumption of homeothermic N. albiventer and P. raptor were 1.43 and 1.38 cc O2 (g·hr)−1, respectively. Oxygen consumption of homeothermic N. albiventer at 25°, 2.59 cc O2 (g.hr)−1, was almost quadruple that of torpid animals at the same temperature. During the daytime both N. albiventer and P. raptor characteristically allowed their body temperatures to fall to near 25°. Both readily aroused from the hypothermic state through physiological means. Heart rates of homeothermic N. albiventer resting at 35° ranged from 312 to 326/min while those of animals torpid at 25° were 88 to 96/min. The capacity for heterothermy has not previously been demonstrated in any members of the Megachiroptera, but our data indicate that it can occur on a daily basis in N. albiventer and P. raptor. This capacity appears to be related to size since it occurs in none of the larger flying foxes so far studied. The data presently available indicate that the relation of body weight to standard metabolism in the Megachiroptera is similar to that of the other placental mammals. In the species we studied, thermal conductances were higher, and heart rates, lower than predicted for mammals of their sizes.

Reviewed by: Deixis and demonstratives in Oceanic languages Paul Geraghty Senft, Gunter , ed. 2004. Deixis and demonstratives in Oceanic languages. PL562. Canberra: Pacific Linguistics. vii + 204 pp. ISBN 0-85883-551-7. Aus$54.00, paper. This collection of papers grew out of a workshop on "Spatial Deixis in Austronesian languages" organized by Senft at the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics in Nijmegen in 1998 and complements similar recent collections of papers inspired by researchers at the same institute (Senft 1997, Bennardo 2002). It consists of an introductory chapter by the editor followed by seven language-specific descriptions, and a concluding chapter in which Malcolm Ross attempts to pull the various threads together in a study of some deictic elements of Proto-Oceanic, and their development in daughter languages. Deixis is an area that has until recently been rather neglected in Oceanic language studies. Essentially it concerns those elements of language whose meaning is determined by the context of the utterance, so includes tense, some time adverbials (e.g., today), some verbs (e.g., come/go, bring/take), demonstratives, some locationals, and pronouns. I like to think of deictics as words with an extra dimension. The emphasis in this collection is on spatial deixis, and particularly demonstratives, though local nouns, directionals, and other deictic forms and uses (such as time and discourse deixis) are also covered by some of the authors. Languages treated are Takia (Bel family, Madang, Papua New Guinea), Saliba (Papuan Tip, Papua New Guinea), Kilivila (Papuan Tip, Papua New Guinea), Pileni (Polynesian outlier, Solomons), Nêlêmwa (New Caledonia), Iaai (Loyalty Islands, New Caledonia), and Samoan (Polynesian). It seems that a chapter on Port Sandwich (South Malakula, Vanuatu) was also planned, but it does not appear—we are not told why, but there are references to this "phantom" chapter in chapter 9. The editor's introduction, chapter 1, sets the scene with a thorough (sometimes perhaps even too thorough!) exposition of what deixis is, and helpful summaries of the following chapters. Readers used to materials written in English will find a refreshing change here, for in addition to the usual suspects of Lyons, Fillmore, Levinson, and Dixon, there are a number of German-language sources, notably Bühler, Ehrlich, and Ebert. Chapter 2, "Aspects of deixis in Takia" by Malcolm Ross, is a description of Takia, a papuanized Oceanic language spoken on a small island off the north coast of New Guinea, focusing on demonstratives, locative noun phrases, and directional and positional verbs. These verbs are used as the second element in serial verb constructions, corresponding to postverbal particles in other Oceanic languages, and Ross argues (in chapter 9) that similar verbs were used in Proto-Oceanic. Unusually for an Oceanic language, Takia demonstratives now exhibit only two (rather than three) degrees of proximity, and Ross suggests that the current anaphoric series derive from what were previously the second-person demonstratives. Some readers may be irked by the odd instance of etymological glossing in this chapter. For instance, the Takia verb en clearly means 'to be' (in its locational sense), as the translation of example 15 as 'there was a house' shows (also example 34). Why then is it glossed in the morpheme-by-morpheme line as 'sleep'? Houses do not sleep, so it cannot [End Page 257] have that meaning here. Whatever the meaning of its Proto-Oceanic precursor may have been is not relevant, nor is the meaning of any homophone it may have. A similar example is the glossing of mala- 'kinsman' as 'eye' (27), and mala- 'front' as 'eye' (28-29), when the meaning 'front' can be reconstructed as far back as Proto-Oceanic, and in chapter 4 Kilivila mata- is similarly glossed as 'eye' when it clearly means 'tip' (76). It's a bit like glossing the English bottom as in the bottom of the garden as 'buttocks'. Chapter 3 is "Spatial deictics in Saliba" by Anna Margetts. Saliba is spoken on and around Saliba Island in Milne Bay Province, Papua New Guinea, and this paper focuses on demonstratives, in particular what factors determine which of the three degrees of proximity is selected. Chapter 4 is "Aspects of spatial deixis in Kilivila...

Locations of present-day Lapita sites bear little resemblance to the landscape of the original Lapita settlers. Understanding landscape change through processes of taphonomy and geomorphology is vital in understanding the nature of past Lapita habitation. This chapter examines a number of Mid-Holocene sites from the north coast of New Guinea, New Ireland, and New Britain, including presentations of their past landscapes, presented.

Flux and fate of fluvial sediments leaving large islands in the East Indies