Tropical quasi-biennial oscillation of the 10mb wind and Indian monsoon rainfall - implications for forecasting.

The fluctuations in the zonal wind anomalies in January at 10mb appear to be highly related to the monsoon rainfall, with rainfall tending to be less (more) than normal during E (W) anomaly, suggesting some predictive value for the Indian monsoon rainfall. The zonal wind anomalies at 10mb lead those at 30mb by 6 months. This lead time is consistent with the well-known downward phase propagation with a speed of 1km/month in the QBO of tropical stratospheric wind. Large-scale flood never occurred during E wind anomalies, and drought almost never during W anomalies in January at 10mb. This suggests that useful probability forecasts of droughts or floods could be prepared

Prokaryotic Hydrocarbon Degraders

Hydrocarbons have been part of the biosphere for millions of years, and a diverse group of prokaryotes has evolved to use them as a source of carbon and energy. To date, the vast majority of formally defined genera are eubacterial, in 7 of the 24 major phyla currently formally recognized by taxonomists (Tree of Life, http://tolweb.org/Eubacteria. Accessed 1 Sept 2017, 2017); principally in the Actinobacteria, the Bacteroidetes, the Firmicutes, and the Proteobacteria. Some Cyanobacteria have been shown to degrade hydrocarbons on a limited scale, but whether this is of any ecological significance remains to be seen – it is likely that all aerobic organisms show some basal metabolism of hydrocarbons by nonspecific oxygenases, and similar “universal” metabolism may occur in anaerobes. This chapter focuses on the now quite large number of named microbial genera where there is reasonably convincing evidence for hydrocarbon metabolism. We have found more than 320 genera of Eubacteria, and 12 genera of Archaea. Molecular methods are revealing a vastly greater diversity of currently uncultured organisms – Hug et al. (Nat Microbiol 1:16048, 2016) claim 92 named bacterial phyla, many with almost totally unknown physiology – and it seems reasonable to believe that the catalog of genera reported here will be substantially expanded in the future