Biozonation of Deep-Water Lithoherms and Associated Hardgrounds in the Northeastern Straits of Florida

Elongated carbonate mounds ( lithoherms ) oriented parallel to prevailing northerly bottom currents at moderate depths (500-700 m) along the western margin of the Little Bahama Bank exhibit a consistent faunal zonation characterized by attached, suspension-feeding invertebrates. The four most abundant macroepibenthic groups (alcyonarians, crinoids, sponges and stylasterid hydrocorals) dominate all hard substrates examined except upcurrent ends and crests of lithoherms. We recognize three faunal zones on these mounds: a Coral Zone (Lophelia prolifera) restricted to the upcurrent end; a Zoanthid Zone (?Gerardia sp.) along upcurrent crests, and a Crinoid/Alcyonarian Zone along lithoherm flanks and downstream crests. Taxa characteristic of the latter also occur on surrounding, low-relief hardgrounds but are accompanied by additional taxa usually absent from mounds. Intervening unconsolidated sediment is largely barren. Biozonation appears chiefly dependent on current flow regime and secondarily on substrate. The observed zonation occurs over a much smaller areal scale than previously reported for deep-water (non-hydrothermal) hard bottoms. Abrupt, small-scale faunal zonation can no longer automatically be considered as evidence of a shallow-water environment in interpreting fossil assemblages

Second Post-Construction Report: 1992 Biological Monitoring of the Hollywood-Hallandale Beach Renourishment. Draft

In 1990. Nova University (Contractor) with Coral Reef Associates and ERM South (Subcontractors) was awarded a contract to provide biological monitoring services for the Hollywood Hallandale Beach Renourishment Project. A notice to proceed for the initial biological monitoring (Pre-construction) was issued in September. 1990. Pre-construction field monitoring took place in October. 1990. Renourishment dredging began in April and ended August, 1991. Approximately 1.2 million cubic yards of sediment were removed and subsequently emplaced on 5 miles of shoreline. The first post-construction monitoring took place in October. 1991. On August 24.1992 the eye of Hurricane Andrew passed some 30 miles to the south of the project area. High winds and heavy seas affected Broward County reefs. The second post-construction monitoring began in October. 1992

Cruise Report: EX-17-11 Gulf of Mexico 2017 (ROV and Mapping)

From November 29, 2017 to December 21, 2017, the NOAA Office of Ocean Exploration and Research (OER) and partners conducted a telepresence-enabled ocean exploration expedition on NOAA Ship Okeanos Explorer to collect critical baseline data and information and to improve knowledge about unexplored and poorly understood deepwater areas of the Gulf of Mexico. The Gulf of Mexico 2017 (EX-17-11) expedition was part of a series of expeditions between 2017 and 2018 that explored deepwater areas in the Gulf of Mexico. During 23 days at sea, 17 remotely operated vehicle (ROV) dives were completed off the Western Florida Escarpment and in the central and western Gulf of Mexico. Over 93 hours of ROV bottom time were logged at depths between 300 and 2,321 meters. Over 20,000 square kilometers of seafloor were mapped. A total of 138 biological and 11 geological samples were collected. The expedition gathered over 280,000 live video views worldwide and the OER website received over 35,600 views. A core onshore science team of over 80 participants from around the world collaborated and supported real-time ocean exploration science. The data associated with this expedition have been archived and are publicly available through the NOAA Archives

Molecular Evidence for Multiple Lineages in the Gorgonian Family Plexauridae (Anthozoa: Octocorallia)

Octocorals are diverse and abundant on many marine hard substrates, and, within this group, members of the family Plexauridae are an important component of tropical reef assemblages, especially in the Caribbean. To understand historical relationships within this large and diverse assemblage, and to test the monophyly of the family and some of its genera, DNA sequences of two mitochondrial loci (msh1 and ND2, ~1,185 bp) were analyzed from 46 species in 21 genera from deep and shallow waters in the tropical western Atlantic and in the tropical western and eastern Pacific (plus 9 taxa in the closely related Gorgoniidae and 1 species of the more distantly related Alcyoniidae). Five strongly supported clades were recovered. Three large clades correspond roughly to the Plexauridae, Paramuriceidae, and Gorgoniidae, and two smaller clades were comprised of taxa previously assigned to several families. Astrogorgia sp. did not group with any of the clades. The mutual relationships among the five clades remain unclear. Several genera previously regarded as unrelated appear to be grouped among the three “families”; e.g. Hypnogorgia sp. (Paramuriceidae) falls within a clade consisting of both Pacific and Atlantic Muricea spp. (Plexauridae), while Swiftia sp., Scleracis sp., and an Atlantic Thesea sp. (all Paramuriceidae) group with the gorgoniids. In several instances, genera containing Atlantic and Pacific species were recovered as monophyletic (Muricea spp., Bebryce spp.). However, in at least three cases (Echinomuricea spp., Thesea spp.,Villogorgia spp.), placement of Atlantic and Pacific species in the same genus may reflect convergence of sclerite morphology. The results indicate a strong need for reexamination of octocoral taxonomy using a combination of molecular, morphological, and chemical evidence

Phase I - Preconstruction Progress Report for Biological Monitoring of the John U. Lloyd Beach Renourishment

In 1987, Nova University (Contractor) with ERM South (Subcontractor) was awarded a contract to provide biological monitoring services for the John U. Lloyd State Recreation Area Beach Renourishment Project. A notice to proceed for the initial biological monitoring (phase I - Preconstruction) was issued in February, 1989. Field monitoring took place in February and March, 1989. Laboratory work has continued from March, 1989 to present. The renourishment dredging took place from May 16, 1989 to July 14, 1989. Approximately 603,000 cu yds of sediment were removed and subsequently emplaced on 1.6 miles of shoreline. Within the next 6 months, Broward County anticipates letting a contract to till the compacted beach to a depth of 36 from the low water line to the upland vegetation line

The Tate conjecture for K3 surfaces over finite fields

Artin's conjecture states that supersingular K3 surfaces over finite fields have Picard number 22. In this paper, we prove Artin's conjecture over fields of characteristic p>3. This implies Tate's conjecture for K3 surfaces over finite fields of characteristic p>3. Our results also yield the Tate conjecture for divisors on certain holomorphic symplectic varieties over finite fields, with some restrictions on the characteristic. As a consequence, we prove the Tate conjecture for cycles of codimension 2 on cubic fourfolds over finite fields of characteristic p>3.Comment: 20 pages, minor changes. Theorem 4 is stated in greater generality, but proofs don't change. Comments still welcom

CN and HCN in Dense Interstellar Clouds

We present a theoretical investigation of CN and HCN molecule formation in dense interstellar clouds. We study the gas-phase CN and HCN production efficiencies from the outer photon-dominated regions (PDRs) into the opaque cosmic-ray dominated cores. We calculate the equilibrium densities of CN and HCN, and of the associated species C+, C, and CO, as functions of the far-ultraviolet (FUV) optical depth. We consider isothermal gas at 50 K, with hydrogen particle densities from 10^2 to 10^6 cm^-3. We study clouds that are exposed to FUV fields with intensities 20 to 2*10^5 times the mean interstellar FUV intensity. We assume cosmic-ray H2 ionization rates ranging from 5*10^-17 s^-1, to an enhanced value of 5*10^-16 s^-1. We also examine the sensitivity of the density profiles to the gas-phase sulfur abundance.Comment: Accepted for publication in ApJ, 33 pages, 8 figure

Differential Gene Expression and Epiregulation of Alpha Zein Gene Copies in Maize Haplotypes

Multigenic traits are very common in plants and cause diversity. Nutritional quality is such a trait, and one of its factors is the composition and relative expression of storage protein genes. In maize, they represent a medium-size gene family distributed over several chromosomes and unlinked locations. Two inbreds, B73 and BSSS53, both from the Iowa Stiff Stock Synthetic collection, have been selected to analyze allelic and non-allelic variability in these regions that span between 80–500 kb of chromosomal DNA. Genes were copied to unlinked sites before and after allotetraploidization of maize, but before transposition enlarged intergenic regions in a haplotype-specific manner. Once genes are copied, expression of donor genes is reduced relative to new copies. Epigenetic regulation seems to contribute to silencing older copies, because some of them can be reactivated when endosperm is maintained as cultured cells, indicating that copy number variation might contribute to a reserve of gene copies. Bisulfite sequencing of the promoter region also shows different methylation patterns among gene clusters as well as differences between tissues, suggesting a possible position effect on regulatory mechanisms as a result of inserting copies at unlinked locations. The observations offer a potential paradigm for how different gene families evolve and the impact this has on their expression and regulation of their members

Tomato protoplast DNA transformation: physical linkage and recombination of exogenous DNA sequences

Tomato protoplasts have been transformed with plasmid DNA's, containing a chimeric kanamycin resistance gene and putative tomato origins of replication. A calcium phosphate-DNA mediated transformation procedure was employed in combination with either polyethylene glycol or polyvinyl alcohol. There were no indications that the tomato DNA inserts conferred autonomous replication on the plasmids. Instead, Southern blot hybridization analysis of seven kanamycin resistant calli revealed the presence of at least one kanamycin resistance locus per transformant integrated in the tomato nuclear DNA. Generally one to three truncated plasmid copies were found integrated into the tomato nuclear DNA, often physically linked to each other. For one transformant we have been able to use the bacterial ampicillin resistance marker of the vector plasmid pUC9 to 'rescue' a recombinant plasmid from the tomato genome. Analysis of the foreign sequences included in the rescued plasmid showed that integration had occurred in a non-repetitive DNA region. Calf-thymus DNA, used as a carrier in transformation procedure, was found to be covalently linked to plasmid DNA sequences in the genomic DNA of one transformant. A model is presented describing the fate of exogenously added DNA during the transformation of a plant cell. The results are discussed in reference to the possibility of isolating DNA sequences responsible for autonomous replication in tomato.