98 research outputs found
Benthic marine calcifiers coexist with CaCO3-undersaturated seawater worldwide
Ocean acidification and decreasing seawater saturation state with respect to calcium carbonate (CaCO3) minerals have raised concerns about the consequences to marine organisms, especially those building structures made of CaCO3. A large proportion of benthic marine calcifiers incorporate Mg2+ into their calcareous structures (i.e., Mg-calcite) which, in general, reduces mineral stability. The vulnerability of some marine calcifiers to ocean acidification is related to the solubility of their calcareous structures, but not all marine organisms conform to this because of sophisticated biological and physiological mechanisms to construct and maintain CaCO3 structures. Few studies have considered seawater saturation state with respect to species-specific mineralogy in evaluating the effect of ocean acidification on marine organisms. Here, a global dataset of skeletal mol % MgCO3 of benthic calcifiers and in situ environmental conditions (temperature, salinity, pressure, and [CO32-]) spanning a depth range of 0 m (subtidal/neritic) to 5500 m (abyssal) was assembled to calculate in situ seawater saturation states with respect to species-specific Mg-calcite mineral compositions (?Mg-x). Up to 20% of all studied calcifiers at depths 1200 m currently experience seawater mineral undersaturation with respect to their skeletal mineral phase (?Mg-x1200 m) of all studied calcifying species to seawater undersaturation. These observations underscore concerns over the ability of marine benthic calcifiers to continue to construct and maintain their calcareous structures under these conditions. We advocate that ocean acidification tipping points can only be understood by assessing species-specific responses, and because of different seawater ?Mg-x present in all marine ecosystems
Climate change threatens the world's marine protected areas
Marine protected areas (MPAs) are a primary management tool for mitigating threats to marine biodiversity 1,2 . MPAs and the species they protect, however, are increasingly being impacted by climate change. Here we show that, despite local protections, the warming associated with continued business-as-usual emissions (RCP8.5) 3 will likely result in further habitat and species losses throughout low-latitude and tropical MPAs 4,5 . With continued business-as-usual emissions, mean sea-surface temperatures within MPAs are projected to increase 0.035 °C per year and warm an additional 2.8 °C by 2100. Under these conditions, the time of emergence (the year when sea-surface temperature and oxygen concentration exceed natural variability) is mid-century in 42% of 309 no-take marine reserves. Moreover, projected warming rates and the existing 'community thermal safety margin' (the inherent buffer against warming based on the thermal sensitivity of constituent species) both vary among ecoregions and with latitude. The community thermal safety margin will be exceeded by 2050 in the tropics and by 2150 for many higher latitude MPAs. Importantly, the spatial distribution of emergence is stressor-specific. Hence, rearranging MPAs to minimize exposure to one stressor could well increase exposure to another. Continued business-as-usual emissions will likely disrupt many marine ecosystems, reducing the benefits of MPAs
Benthic marine calcifiers coexist with CaCO3-undersaturated seawater worldwide
Ocean acidification and decreasing seawater saturation state with respect to calcium carbonate (CaCO3) minerals have raised concerns about the consequences to marine organisms, especially those building structures made of CaCO3. A large proportion of benthic marine calcifiers incorporate Mg2+ into their calcareous structures (i.e., Mg-calcite) which, in general, reduces mineral stability. The vulnerability of some marine calcifiers to ocean acidification is related to the solubility of their calcareous structures, but not all marine organisms conform to this because of sophisticated biological and physiological mechanisms to construct and maintain CaCO3 structures. Few studies have considered seawater saturation state with respect to species-specific mineralogy in evaluating the effect of ocean acidification on marine organisms. Here, a global dataset of skeletal mol % MgCO3 of benthic calcifiers and in situ environmental conditions (temperature, salinity, pressure, and [CO32-]) spanning a depth range of 0 m (subtidal/neritic) to 5500 m (abyssal) was assembled to calculate in situ seawater saturation states with respect to species-specific Mg-calcite mineral compositions (?Mg-x). Up to 20% of all studied calcifiers at depths <1200 m and approximately 90% of calcifiers at depths >1200 m currently experience seawater mineral undersaturation with respect to their skeletal mineral phase (?Mg-x<1). We conclude that as a result of predicted anthropogenic ocean acidification over the next 150 years, the predicted decrease in seawater mineral saturation, will expose approximately 50% (<1200 m) and 100% (>1200 m) of all studied calcifying species to seawater undersaturation. These observations underscore concerns over the ability of marine benthic calcifiers to continue to construct and maintain their calcareous structures under these conditions. We advocate that ocean acidification tipping points can only be understood by assessing species-specific responses, and because of different seawater ?Mg-x present in all marine ecosystems
Local fluctuations in quantum critical metals
We show that spatially local, yet low-energy, fluctuations can play an
essential role in the physics of strongly correlated electron systems tuned to
a quantum critical point. A detailed microscopic analysis of the Kondo lattice
model is carried out within an extended dynamical mean-field approach. The
correlation functions for the lattice model are calculated through a
self-consistent Bose-Fermi Kondo problem, in which a local moment is coupled
both to a fermionic bath and to a bosonic bath (a fluctuating magnetic field).
A renormalization-group treatment of this impurity problem--perturbative in
, where is an exponent characterizing the spectrum
of the bosonic bath--shows that competition between the two couplings can drive
the local-moment fluctuations critical. As a result, two distinct types of
quantum critical point emerge in the Kondo lattice, one being of the usual
spin-density-wave type, the other ``locally critical.'' Near the locally
critical point, the dynamical spin susceptibility exhibits scaling
with a fractional exponent. While the spin-density-wave critical point is
Gaussian, the locally critical point is an interacting fixed point at which
long-wavelength and spatially local critical modes coexist. A Ginzburg-Landau
description for the locally critical point is discussed. It is argued that
these results are robust, that local criticality provides a natural description
of the quantum critical behavior seen in a number of heavy-fermion metals, and
that this picture may also be relevant to other strongly correlated metals.Comment: 20 pages, 12 figures; typos in figure 3 and in the main text
corrected, version as publishe
Statistical mechanics of two-dimensional vortices and stellar systems
The formation of large-scale vortices is an intriguing phenomenon in
two-dimensional turbulence. Such organization is observed in large-scale
oceanic or atmospheric flows, and can be reproduced in laboratory experiments
and numerical simulations. A general explanation of this organization was first
proposed by Onsager (1949) by considering the statistical mechanics for a set
of point vortices in two-dimensional hydrodynamics. Similarly, the structure
and the organization of stellar systems (globular clusters, elliptical
galaxies,...) in astrophysics can be understood by developing a statistical
mechanics for a system of particles in gravitational interaction as initiated
by Chandrasekhar (1942). These statistical mechanics turn out to be relatively
similar and present the same difficulties due to the unshielded long-range
nature of the interaction. This analogy concerns not only the equilibrium
states, i.e. the formation of large-scale structures, but also the relaxation
towards equilibrium and the statistics of fluctuations. We will discuss these
analogies in detail and also point out the specificities of each system.Comment: Chapter of the forthcoming "Lecture Notes in Physics" volume:
``Dynamics and Thermodynamics of Systems with Long Range Interactions'', T.
Dauxois, S. Ruffo, E. Arimondo, M. Wilkens Eds., Lecture Notes in Physics
Vol. 602, Springer (2002
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