Northeastern Coast Research Articles

Northern Hemisphere Heat Extremes in a Warmer Climate: More Probable but Less Colocated With Blocking

AbstractThis work uses reanalysis and NOAA Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory's Coupled Model Intercomparison Project 6 model, CM4, to investigate the colocation of heat extremes and atmospheric blocking in the current climate and an end of 21st century, extreme‐emissions projection. In the present day, the colocation of heat events and blocking is greatest for the strongest heat events. Block‐heat extreme colocation is found to be less prevalent over ocean than land, exhibiting regional variation throughout the Northern Hemisphere. Over North America, colocation is greatest near the northwestern and northeastern coasts, minimizing near the center; over Eurasia, colocation is most prevalent in northern regions. In an RCP 8.5 projection, the historical 90th percentile temperature decreases to 0–70th percentile, depending on the region. This is primarily driven by mean state warming. Blocking is found to decrease along with the colocation of blocking and heat extremes, suggesting that in some regions, the mechanisms driving heat extremes will change in future climates.

Influence of oyster and seaweed cultivation facilities on coastal environment and eukaryote assemblages in Matsushima Bay, northeastern Honshu, Japan

The northeastern coast of Japan suffered a massive tsunami in 2011, a natural disaster which ‘reset’ the coastal ecosystem when it destroyed much of the original sealife and scoured the seabed. This has presented an opportunity to learn more about the load on coastal ecosystems exerted by human exploitation such as aquaculture rafts and areas of anchored and float-suspended ropes. We surveyed the coastal environment in Matsushima Bay for approximately four years following the year after the occurrence of the 2011 tsunami. Phytoplankton abundance increased with increasing water temperature. Nutrient concentrations were high at the exit of a small branch of the Ofuna-iri Canal (entering the southwestern inner part of the bay at Shiogama) but no significant differences in nutrient concentrations were observed at other stations, so it is considered that the aquaculture installations in Matsushima Bay currently have no significant effect on observed nutrient concentrations. The composition of eukaryotes in the surface seawater varied with the year and the season, but there were no clear differences between sampling stations. The lack of any differences in nutrient concentrations or eukaryote assemblages between areas with or without aquaculture installations is considered to be a result of efficient seawater exchange, despite the presence of many small islets separating Matsushima Bay from the open ocean. In addition, the aquaculture installations at present number less than half of the maximum number before the tsunami, so the bay is by no means overexploited by aquaculture. It is concluded that the current aquaculture installations have no major negative impact on the environment in Matsushima Bay.

Energetics of eddy–mean flow interactions in the deep western boundary current off the northeastern coast of Brazil

Thirty-six years output of a 1/10° eddy-resolving Ocean General Circulation Model are used to analyze the energetics of eddy–mean flow interactions in the Deep Western Boundary Current (DWBC) region of the tropical South Atlantic between 5°S and 16°S. The DWBC flow has a coherent structure between 5°S and 8°S but breaks up into a train of eddies downstream of a region of strong bathymetric curvature at 8°S. In the train of eddies area, the seasonal cycle of eddy kinetic energy (EKE) exhibits poleward phase propagation from May to September. The connection between the seasonal cycle of mean kinetic energy and EKE indicates an intensification of the downstream eddy field associated with enhanced upstream mean flow. The magnitudes of the baroclinic conversion and vertical eddy density flux terms are small in the DWBC core layer depth but somewhat elevated 500 m above and below the core. Eddy processes, including eddy generation and propagation, are accompanied by high EKE and large barotropic conversion. While in the global ocean baroclinic conversion is thought to dominate the energy transfer to EKE, our results suggest that barotropic energy conversion is the primary source of EKE and modulates its variability in the DWBC region of the deeper ocean.

Trapezus in Kolchis. Part I: The Origin of the Tabula Peutingeriana under Julius Caesar

The Greek colony Trapezus is located in Pontic Asia Minor in the south-eastern angle of the Black Sea littoral, but the Tabula Peutingeriana locates it on the north-eastern coast. Alexander Podossinov has recently argued that this error should be traced to the naval campaign of Marcus Agrippa in 14 BCE. This deputy of Augustus wrote geographical notes on which the world map in the Porticus Vipsania in Rome was based. However, Agrippa should have been much more familiar with the geography of the Black Sea. Pliny credits him with substantial knowledge especially on the western and northern Euxine coastlines, which is incompatible with the flaws resulting in the poor coverage of the Black Sea on the Tabula: not even the two capital cities Pantikapaion and Phanagoreia are included, and even worse, the Maiotis appears as an inland lake with no access to the sea. At any rate, Agrippa must have been aware of the mapping project initiated by Julius Caesar, but concluded only between 30 and ca. 20 BCE. This new wealth of information was not yet available to Caesar himself and his staff, when planning the instant Parthian campaign in 44 BCE without being overly concerned with Black Sea geography. The final phase of Caesar’s dictatorship might thus have formed the context for a first, rushed, and flawed, yet highly authoritative mapped itinerary of the whole known world that gradually developed into the Tabula Peutingeriana. Over the next five centuries, some parts of it were revised, while others (such as on the northern shore of the Black Sea) were not.

Molecular and morphological characterization of Andracantha gravida (Alegret, 1941) (Acanthocephala: Polymorphidae) in piscivorous birds from the Gulf of Mexico.

Adult specimens of Andracantha gravida (Alegret, 1941) were recorded from the intestines of the double-crested cormorant Nannopterum auritus (Lesson) (type host) and brown pelican Pelecanus occidentalis L. in two localities from Mexico: Celestún, Yucatan (south-eastern) and Punta Piedra, Tamaulipas (north-eastern). The specimens of A. gravida are morphologically characterized by having a pipe-shaped body without swellings, the absence of small trunk spines between the two fields of spines on the foretrunk and a cylindrical proboscis with 14-16 rows of 10-12 hooks per row. Newly generated partial sequences of the mitochondrial cytochrome c oxidase subunit 1 (cox1) gene were generated from adult isolates of A. gravida from Mexico and compared with one sequence of A. gravida and with sequences of other polymorphid acanthocephalans available in GenBank. Phylogenetic analyses based on maximum likelihood and Bayesian inference methods of the cox1 dataset placed all the species of Andracantha in a single clade, with weak support. The analyses of the cox1 dataset placed Andracantha sigma Presswell, García-Varela & Smales, , as sister to the clade formed by A. gravida, Andracantha phalacrocoracis (Yamaguti, 1939), Andracantha leucocarboi Presswell, García-Varela & Smales, and an unidentified species of Andracantha from Japan. The newly generated cox1 sequences of A. gravida from piscivorous birds of Mexico formed a strongly supported clade with the published sequence of A. gravida from the double-crested cormorant from the south-eastern coast of Mexico. The intraspecific genetic divergence among isolates identified as A. gravida ranged from 0.0% to 2.2%. A cox1 haplotype network inferred with 14 sequences revealed the presence of nine haplotypes, two of which were shared between the populations of piscivorous birds from the north-eastern and south-eastern coasts of Mexico and seven of which were unique. The fixation index between the populations from north-eastern and south-eastern Mexico was low (0.06949), which suggests genetic flow. This can be explained by the migration patterns of the brown pelican and the double-crested cormorant along the coasts of the Gulf of Mexico.

Spatio-Temporal Changes in the Northeastern Coast of China in Recent 10 Years Based on Google Earth Engine and Intelligent Image Processing Technology—A Case Study of Heilongjiang Province and Shandong Province

Water is a very important resource, which plays an important role in human life and production. Rapid and accurate water body information acquisition is of great significance for national resource management, planning, development, and rapid disaster assessment. The purpose of this paper is to explore and analyze the temporal and spatial changes of water bodies in the northeastern coastal areas of China in recent 10 years. Taking shandong province and heilongjiang province as the research area, Based on Google Earth engine, we used Landsat5, 7 and 8 images as data sources, comparing various water extraction methods, we finally selected the modified normalized water index model (MNDWI) to extract water, study the dynamic changes of water in ten years, and use supervised classification method to verify the accuracy. According to the results, the total water area in Shandong province decreased from 13067.08km2 in 2010 to 9418.58km2 in 2020, with an area decrease of 27.92%. The total water area of Heilongjiang province increased from 6154.782174km2 in 2008 to 7179.088516 km2 in 2018, an increase of about 14%. Then, according to the change of water area, the influencing factors are analyzed from natural and human perspectives. It is of great theoretical and practical significance for protecting and utilizing water resource by study the temporal and spatial changes of water bodies.

Über die Landstraße entlang der Südküste des Schwarzen Meeres auf der Peutinger’s Karte: wie arbeitete der Kartograph

The article discusses the land road laid along the southern coast of the Black Sea from the Thracian Bosporus to Trapezunt on the Tabula Peutingeriana. In antiquity this region’s natural conditions (mountain ranges, descending to the sea, and wide rivers) stood in the way, so the path could not be laid there. Literary and archeological sources, milestones among them, do not confirm its existence. So, the article discusses possible causes and conditions which permitted the cartographer, who having used existing Greek periploi describing the coast, to “reconstruct” the possible land road. The article analyzes in detail the data of the Tabula Peutingeriana, which shows the path along the coast and the distances between “the stations”, these data being compared with the information of other sources (geographical texts), mostly with those of periploi describing the route of the ship close to the shore (the main source is “Periplus of the Pontus Euxinus” by Arrian). It has been found out that the distances between the stations correspond rather to the data of periploi; it means that the non-existent road was the cartographer’s invention, who supported on such literature. Also, the article mentions the absence of the road’s description in “The Antonine Itinerary”, where the descriptions of many ways coincide with the data of the Tabula Peutingeriana. It is noteworthy that this is not the first road along the sea coast on the Tabula which could not really exist. Thus, it shows an coastal road in Asia Minor between the Ionian city of Miletus and the Lycian city of Patara, led through Myndos, Knidos and Loryma. These cities’ geographical location does not assume the existence of the coastal road between them, but is based on the data of a periplus, possibly used by the cartographer. Also, the article draws a parallel with the path along the north-eastern coast of the Black Sea (now Abkhazia), where rivers and mountains impeded communication in antiquity and in the following centuries, until the twentieth century.

LONG-TERM TREND OF NITROGEN AND PHOSPHORUS TRANSPORT IN 12 TROPICAL COASTAL WATERSHEDS IN NORTHEAST BRAZIL

Multiple environmental problems are caused by the accumulation of nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) in river water on its way to the ocean. The objective of this work was to determine the N and P loads in 12 hydrographic basins that flow into estuaries along the northeastern coast of Brazil using established methods. Additionally, natural and anthropogenic loads trends in the hydrographic basins of 12 tropical rivers in northeastern Brazil over 27 years (1990-2016) were evaluated. The results indicated an annual average increase of +1.1% in population density, while precipitation showed no significant trend. The anthropogenic loads were 21 and 112 times higher than natural inputs for N and P, respectively. Anthropogenic sources accounted for ~ 96% of all contributions. The positive trends of these loads (mainly wastewater) represented an annual average increase of 1.1% for N and 1.2% for P, for all river basins included in this study. These percentages represent average annual loads of 251 t N yr-1 and 54.8 t P yr-1. The time series of N and P in the study region showed trends that point to a constant increase, implying a greater contribution of these loads to the adjacent coastal region year after year.

Multiple datasets confirm range extension of the sicklefin devil ray Mobula tarapacana in the western North Atlantic Ocean off the eastern USA

Abstract The sicklefin devil ray (Mobula tarapacana) is a large, pelagic ray which is listed as Endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). Mobula tarapacana is thought to have a circumglobal, yet patchy distribution, and has not been verified extant off the eastern USA. Here, we report 180 sightings of M. tarapacana with a total of 361 individuals, collated across five datasets from aerial survey operations and incidental sightings in the waters off the US East Coast and Gulf of Mexico, between 1996 and 2022. This study extends the northern range of M. tarapacana in the Gulf of Mexico to 29°N, and in the Atlantic to 40°N. Seasonal trends were observed off the north-eastern coast of the USA, with M. tarapacana only present in the summer months. Measurements from high resolution digital aerial imagery found M. tarapacana off the New York coast to be adults and subadults with an average disc width of 268 cm (±25, range 232–316 cm). This study provides important spatial and temporal data for management, as well as informing areas for future research on M. tarapacana in the western Atlantic.

Size and sex composition of three carcharhiniform sharks landed by a coastal artisanal fleet from the northeastern coast of Brazil

Abstract Sharks are among the marine organisms most impacted by intense fisheries, a worrying fact since they are key components in the trophic structure of ecosystems. In this context, fish landing data can help managers in shark conservation. This study characterized the landings of Carcharhinus acronotus, Mustelus cf. canis, and Sphyrna mokarran in the Mucuripe Embayment, Ceará, Brazil, along three study periods (1998–1999, 2006–2008, and 2015–2016). A total of 223 specimens were recorded from 227 site visits. Carcharhinus acronotus specimens measured from 50 to 139 cm in total length (TL), with a 1.3:1 sex ratio in favor of males. Most of the specimens recorded were adults (55.1% of males and 62.9% of females). Mustelus cf. canis varied from 64 to 133 cm in TL, with a sex ratio in favor of females (3.1:1). Most of the specimens recorded were adults (50% of males and 68% of females). Sphyrna mokarran specimens varied from 116 to 380 cm in TL, with a sex ratio of 7:1 in favor of males. Most of the specimens recorded were juveniles. This is the first fishery-dependent study to provide information on size and sex composition of these species for most of the southwestern equatorial Atlantic.

Descriptive text to the Geological map of Denmark, 1:50 000, Møn 1511 I, 1511 IV and 1512 II

Descriptive text to the Geological map of Denmark, 1:50 000, Møn 1511 I, 1511 IV and 1512 II

THE TRACES OF THE EARLY IRON AGE AT AMOS

In this study, the evidence of the Early Iron Age obtained by the recent excavations carried out at Amos will be
 discussed. Amos located on the northeastern coast of Karia Chersonesos (Bozburun Peninsula), on the Asarcık Hill.
 Amos firstly appeared in the historical records by the 5th century BC. Amos, as a member of the Delian League, was
 recorded on the Athenian Tribute Lists of 428 BC. Following the establishment of the Rhodes state in 408 BC, the
 city became part of the Rhodian Peraea (Incorporated Peraea) and continued this situation until the 2nd century AD.
 Amos, also led a koinon, was abandoned by the 3rd century BC. The only research in the city was carried out by G.
 E. Bean in 1948. In addition to the survey that have been going on since 2019, the excavations began in 2020 yielded
 the earliest evidence of Amos. Up to the present, the earliest archaeological finds of Amos were from the 6th century
 BC. In the excavations carried out in the temple on the acropolis in 2021, some traces of the Early Iron Age were
 found. The remains of an apsidal building dated to the 10th century BC were found below the temple. Furthermore,
 outside the edifice a pyre (cremation area) associated with the building was found. After the secondary cremation,
 the intramural burial was placed under the floor of the structure. The first one of the two burials was placed in a belly
 amphora, the other into a necked amphora. Among the two urns, the necked amphora is decorated with concentric
 circles, while the belly amphora is a coarse ware. A bow fibula was found along with these amphorae as well.
 According to the widely view regarding the burial customs of the period, belly amphorae were preferred for women
 and necked amphorae for men. The apsidal building where a couple as an intramural burial in, must have belonged
 to a chief owing to a similar one in Lefkandi. It is possible to date the evidence at Amos from the Early Iron Age to
 the 10th century BC.

Coastal Cannibals: Industry and Occupation on Whangārei Te Rerenga Paraoa

Coastal Cannibals is a photographic series exploring the impacts, contradictions, and possibilities of “development” within Whangārei Te Rerenga Paraoa (Whangārei Harbour). Located on New Zealand’s northeastern coast, Whangārei Harbour is a site of significant cultural, ecological, and historical significance for the different iwi (tribes) and hapū (subtribes) who have resided—and continue to reside—there. For these tribes, maintaining unbroken occupation has not been straightforward; the harbour is a contested and still-consumed space. Iwi and hapū contend with heavy industry, residential developments, and regional policies that both disregard tribal authority and disrupt kaitiakitanga (guardianship relations). Coastal Cannibals focuses on the harbour’s shoreline developments, where industry is both a source of tension for iwi and hapū, as it places huge pressures on the ocean and surrounding environs, and of necessary jobs and income for a historically underserviced region. For those committed to Indigeneity, occupation is never a straightforward affair. In the postcolonial tradition of “speaking back,” the photo series draws its title from a description used against the great Ngātiwai rangatira Paratene Te Manu prior to his and his tribe’s eviction from the nearby Te Hauturu-o-Toi (Little Barrier Island), asking us today: who is eating away at what?

A multidisciplinary toolset to study a fifth millennium combustion structure from the northeastern coast of the Iberian Peninsula

Prehistoric combustion structures are a consequence of the economic and social conditions of past communities. Through the study of the “social life” of a combustion structure of the SBUS (simple basin structure with unconstrained stones) type, which are abundant in the archaeological record of the Iberan northeast, specifically in the Barcelona Plain, this paper will explore the degree of implantation and consolidation of neolithic societies in their surrounding territory. Thanks to the close collaboration between rescue archaeologists and university specialists, a systematic collection of high-resolution analytical techniques was carried out for the combustion structure (EC2) located at Carrer Aurora (Raval archaeological site, Barcelona). Our deployed toolset includes geological, archaeomagnetic, archaeobotanical, microspatial, micromorphological and biochemical analyses. This is the first time this type of approach has been applied to a combustion structure from the northeastern coast of the Iberian Peninsula to better understand their process of construction, use and abandonment.

Oil Spill in Brazil—Analysis of Vulnerabilities and Socio-Environmental Conflicts

The 2019 oil spill was considered the largest environmental disaster in the Brazilian Northeastern coast. It was associated with mostly ineffective government actions, thus intensifying historical vulnerabilities faced by local populations. We aimed to analyze the environmental conflicts and injustices and the socio-environmental, economic, and health vulnerabilities arising from the oil spill, considering the COVID-19 pandemic, impacting artisanal fishing communities of the Northeastern coast. A document-based, qualitative, cross-sectional research was carried out between September 2019 and October 2022, in open access secondary databases, and using field diaries from research of the Environmental Health and Work Laboratory (LASAT) of the Aggeu Magalhães Institute of the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation. The disaster caused situations of injustice and environmental conflicts that had negative repercussions in the territories with socioeconomic impacts, on the environment, and on the health of the population. The entire marine environment was affected, resulting in physical and chemical alterations. The health vulnerabilities faced by local people were intensified, influencing the social determination of the health–disease process. The local economy was extremely affected, generating job insecurity and several socio-cultural problems. It is essential to build environmental and health diagnoses for remedial measures in disasters such as the oil spill.

Modeling of historical and current distributions of lone star tick, Amblyomma americanum (Acari: Ixodidae), is consistent with ancestral range recovery.

The lone star tick, Amblyomma americanum L., is a three-host hard tick notorious for aggressive feeding behavior. In the early to mid-20th century, this species' range was mostly limited to the southern USA. Since the 1950s, A. americanum has been detected in many new localities in the western, northcentral, and northeastern regions of the country. To examine the influence of climate on this apparent expansion, we used historical (1748-1950) lone star locations from the literature and museum records to model areas suitable for this species based on past environmental conditions in the late 1800s - early 1900s. We then projected this model forward using present (2011-2020) climatic conditions and compared the two for evidence of climate-associated distributional shifts. A maximum entropy distribution or Maxent model was generated by using a priori selected climatic variables including temperature, precipitation, and vapor pressure deficit. Temperature and vapor pressure deficit were selected as the most important factors in creating a sensitive and specific model (success rate = 82.6 ± 6.1%) that had a good fit to the existing data and was significantly better than a random model [partial ROC (receiver operating characteristic) to AUC (area under the ROC curve) ratio = 1.97 ± 0.07, P < 0.001]. The present projected model was tested with an independent dataset of curated museum records (1952-2020) and found to be 95.6% accurate. Comparison of past and present models revealed > 98% A. americanum niche overlap. The model suggests that some areas along the western fringe are becoming less suitable for A. americanum, whereas areas in some Great Lakes and coastal northeastern regions are becoming more suitable, results that are compatible with possible effects of climate change. However, these changes are minor, and overall climate in North America does not appear to have changed in ways significant to A. americanum's distribution. These findings are consistent with an alternative hypothesis that recent changes in A. americanum's distribution are a result of this species re-occupying its historical range, driven predominantly by factors other than climate, such as shifts in land use and population densities of major hosts.

The Dynamics of the Abundance and Intrapopulation Structure of Pink Salmon at the Western and Northeastern Coasts of Kamchatka

The Dynamics of the Abundance and Intrapopulation Structure of Pink Salmon at the Western and Northeastern Coasts of Kamchatka

Macrosymbionts of starfish Echinaster luzonicus (Gray, 1840) in the waters of a volcanic western Pacific island.

During an investigation program of faunal diversity in the shallow reef zone of the active volcanic island off northeastern Taiwan in July and September 2020, numerous individuals of the starfish Echinaster luzonicus (Gray, 1840) were found, and some individuals were found with associated symbionts. Starfish sampling in the 150-m coral reef zone was undertaken at a depth of 8 m through scuba diving. For each type of potential macrosymbiont, both the dorsal and ventral sides were carefully examined. The prevalence of macrosymbionts on the starfish E. luzonicus was recorded. The most common symbiotic organism on E. luzonicus was the ectoparasitic snail Melanella martinii (A. Adams in Sowerby, 1854), followed by the pontoniine shrimp Zenopontonia soror (Nobili, 1904) and the rare polychaete scaleworm Asterophilia carlae Hanley, 1989. The prevalence ratio with host E. luzonicus was low and varied by 8.62% and 4.35%, 6.03% and 0%, and 0.86% and 0.72% in July and September 2020 for M. martinii, Z. soror, and A. carlae, respectively. The present study is the first to discover the scaleworm A. carlae as a macrosymbiont of the tropical starfish E. luzonicus, with a widespread distribution, off Taiwan's northeastern coast, an area influenced by the Kuroshio Current.

The impact of climate change on the storm surges of the Mediterranean Sea: Coastal sea level responses to deep depression atmospheric systems

The impact of climate change on the storm surges of the Mediterranean Sea: Coastal sea level responses to deep depression atmospheric systems

Sea slugs (Gastropoda: Heterobranchia) from Rio Grande do Norte, Northeastern Brazil

Heterobranch sea slugs (Gastropoda) present reduction, internalization, or absence of shell, and include more than 6,000 described species. Approximately 250 species are recorded from Brazil but only 14 had been previously recorded from Rio Grande do Norte, on the Brazilian northeastern coast. As a result of different expeditions conducted between 2008 and 2020, species were collected and identified. Among them, five species were recorded for the first time from the South Atlantic Ocean: Chelidonura hirundinina (Quoy &amp; Gaimard, 1833); Sclerodoris prea (Ev. Marcus &amp; Er. Marcus, 1967); Thuridilla malaquita Ortea &amp; Buske, 2014; Berthella nebula Ghanimi, Schrödl, Goddard, Ballesteros, Gosliner &amp; Valdés, 2020 and Berthella vialactea Ghanimi, Schrödl, Goddard, Ballesteros, Gosliner &amp; Valdés, 2020. Thirty-six species are recorded for the first time from Rio Grande do Norte. The present survey expands the knowledge of the diversity of sea slugs from Brazil and supports the hypothesis of similarity between the heterobranch sea slug fauna from the northeastern Brazil and the Caribbean Sea.