During El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) events, atmospheric teleconnections associated with sea surface temperature (SST) anomalies in the equatorial Pacific can influence the ocean thousands of kilometers away. We use several data sets to delineate this “atmospheric bridge” between ocean basins, focusing on two emerging research areas: 1) the evolution of atmosphere-ocean interactions in th...

total of 35 species of leucosiid crabs have been recorded by several authors and the current survey from the persian gulf. here, zoogeography of these species and their zoogeographical affinities within indo-west pacific region are discussed. in addition, present taxonomic survey off the iranian coasts of the persian gulf resulted in finding 14 leucosiid crabs, of which arcania erinacea and par...

The ascidian fauna of the Pacific coast of Panama is poorly known and only recently four species in the family Ascidiidae were reported on. Ascidia is the only known genus of Ascidiidae in Pacific Panama waters. In the present research, we describe a new species, Ascidia sideralis sp. nov., and we document the new occurrence of A. cf. gemmata and A. cf. liberata (both previously known to the We...

The harbor seal (Phoca vitulina) has one of the broadest geographic distributions of any pinniped, stretching from the east Baltic, west across the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans to southern Japan. Although individuals may travel several hundred kilometers on annual feeding migrations, harbor seals are generally believed to be philopatric, returning to the same areas each year to breed. Consequent...

Prior to the 1976–77 climate shift (1950–76), sea surface temperature (SST) anomalies in the tropical Indian Ocean consisted of a basinwide warming during boreal fall of the developing phase of most El Niños, whereas after the shift (1977–99) they had an east–west asymmetry—a consequence of El Niño being associated with the Indian Ocean Dipole/Zonal mode. In this study, the possible impact of t...

STOCK DEFINITION AND GEOGRAPHIC RANGE The gray whale formerly occurred in the North Atlantic Ocean (Fraser 1970), but is currently only found in the North Pacific (Rice et al. 1984). The following information was cons idered in classifying stock structure of gray whales based on the Dizon et al. (1992) phylogeographic approach: 1) Distributional data: two isolated geographic distributions in th...

It has been widely believed that the tropical Pacific trade winds weakened in the last century and would further decrease under a warmer climate in the 21st century. Recent high-quality observations, however, suggest that the tropical Pacific winds have actually strengthened in the past two decades. Precise causes of the recent Pacific climate shift are uncertain. Here we explore how the enhanc...

Echinoids fauna are common and distributed in the Lower Miocene deposits of the Bagher Abad area, northeast Isfahan, Central Iran.There are six Echinoid taxa belonging to the Echinoidea Class that can be described as: Clypeaster intermedius, Prinocidaris sp. andspines related to: Eucidaris zaemays, Stylocidaris Polyacantha, Spatangoid sp. and Prinocidaris sp. Bivalves, Foraminifers,Bryozoans, B...

[1] The South Pacific Convergence Zone (SPCZ) is the largest and most persistent spur of the Intertropical Convergence Zone. At the southeastern edge of the SPCZ near 170 W and 15 –20 S a surface ocean salinity frontal zone exists that separates fresher Western Pacific Warm Pool water from saltier and cooler waters in the east. This salinity front is known to shift east and west with the phase ...