BACKGROUND With the increasing incidence of asthma, there is increasing concern over environmental exposures that may trigger asthma exacerbations. Blooms of the marine microalgae, Karenia brevis, cause red tides (or harmful algal blooms) annually throughout the Gulf of Mexico. K brevis produces highly potent natural polyether toxins, called brevetoxins, which are sodium channel blockers, and p...

A robust method to estimate vertical crustal motions by combining geocentric sea level measurements from decadal (1992 2003) TOPEX/POSEIDON satellite altimetry and long-term (> 40 years) relative sea level records from tide gauges using a novel Gauss-Markov stochastic adjustment model is presented. These results represent an improvement over a prior study (Kuo et al. 2004) in Fennoscandia, wher...

A series of dye releases in the Hudson River estuary elucidated diapycnal mixing rates and temporal variability over tidal and fortnightly time scales. Dye was injected in the bottom boundary layer for each of four releases during different phases of the tide and of the spring–neap cycle. Diapycnal mixing occurs primarily through entrainment that is driven by shear production in the bottom boun...

The accuracy of state-of-the-art global barotropic tide models is assessed using bottom pressure data, coastal tide gauges, satellite altimetry, various geodetic data on Antarctic ice shelves, and independent tracked satellite orbit perturbations. Tide models under review include empirical, purely hydrodynamic (“forward”), and assimilative dynamical, i.e., constrained by observations. Ten domin...

The contribution of tide-gauge data, which provide a unique monitoring of sea-level variability along the coasts of the world ocean, to operational oceanography is discussed in this paper. Two distinct applications that both demonstrate tide-gauge data utility when delivered in real-time are illustrated. The first case details basin-scale operational model validation of the French Mercator oper...

The long-term sea level change during 1993 to 2008 was investigated in the Malaysian seas from satellite altimetry data of the TOPEX, JASON-1, ERS-1, ERS-2 and ENVISAT missions. Sea level data retrieval and reduction were carried out using the radar altimeter database system (RADS). In RADS data processing, the 2008 updated environmental and geophysical corrections were applied. Six 1° × 1° are...

Adjacent to the northern suburbs of Darwin is a coastal wetland that contains important larval habitats for Aedes vigilax (Skuse), the northern salt marsh mosquito. This species is a vector for Ross River virus and Barmah Forest virus, as well as an appreciable human pest. In order to improve aerial larval control efforts, we sought to identify the most important vegetation categories and clima...

[1] We present a case study of the non‐linear interaction between the quasi‐two day wave (Q2DW) and the migrating diurnal tide based on global synoptic meridional wind fields for January 2006 and January 2008 from a high‐altitude data assimilation/forecast system. We find large quasi‐two day wave amplitudes, small diurnal tide amplitudes, and phase locking of the Q2DW with the diurnal cycle dur...

Based on the field data of velocity profile observed at 23 measuring sites distributed over the Changjiang River Estuary in March and September, 1996, the momentum coefficients are calculated and their temporal and spatial distribution characteristics are obtained through statistical analysis. For different typical time interval and different places in the Changjiang River Estuary, the results ...

BACKGROUND Our understanding of the functional consequences of changes in biodiversity has been hampered by several limitations of previous work, including limited attention to trophic interactions, a focus on species richness rather than evenness, and the use of artificially assembled communities. METHODOLOGY AND PRINCIPAL FINDINGS In this study, we manipulated the density of an herbivorous ...