A review of elliptical and disc galaxy structure, and modern scaling laws

A century ago, in 1911 and 1913, Plummer and then Reynolds introduced their models to describe the radial distribution of stars in `nebulae'. This article reviews the progress since then, providing both an historical perspective and a contemporary review of the stellar structure of bulges, discs and elliptical galaxies. The quantification of galaxy nuclei, such as central mass deficits and excess nuclear light, plus the structure of dark matter halos and cD galaxy envelopes, are discussed. Issues pertaining to spiral galaxies including dust, bulge-to-disc ratios, bulgeless galaxies, bars and the identification of pseudobulges are also reviewed. An array of modern scaling relations involving sizes, luminosities, surface brightnesses and stellar concentrations are presented, many of which are shown to be curved. These 'redshift zero' relations not only quantify the behavior and nature of galaxies in the Universe today, but are the modern benchmark for evolutionary studies of galaxies, whether based on observations, N-body-simulations or semi-analytical modelling. For example, it is shown that some of the recently discovered compact elliptical galaxies at 1.5 < z < 2.5 may be the bulges of modern disc galaxies.Comment: Condensed version (due to Contract) of an invited review article to appear in "Planets, Stars and Stellar Systems"(www.springer.com/astronomy/book/978-90-481-8818-5). 500+ references incl. many somewhat forgotten, pioneer papers. Original submission to Springer: 07-June-201

The Biology and Economics of Coral Growth

To protect natural coral reefs, it is of utmost importance to understand how the growth of the main reef-building organisms—the zooxanthellate scleractinian corals—is controlled. Understanding coral growth is also relevant for coral aquaculture, which is a rapidly developing business. This review paper provides a comprehensive overview of factors that can influence the growth of zooxanthellate scleractinian corals, with particular emphasis on interactions between these factors. Furthermore, the kinetic principles underlying coral growth are discussed. The reviewed information is put into an economic perspective by making an estimation of the costs of coral aquaculture

Loss of coral reef growth capacity to track future increases in sea level

Water-depths above coral reefs is predicted to increase due to global sea-level rise (SLR). As ecological degradation inhibits the vertical accretion of coral reefs, it is likely that coastal wave exposure will increase but there currently exists a lack of data in projections concerning local rates of reef growth and local SLR. In this study we have aggregated ecological data of more than 200 tropical western Atlantic and Indian Ocean reefs and calculated their vertical growth which we have then compared with recent and projected rates of SLR across different Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP) scenarios. While many reefs currently show vertical growth that would be sufficient to keep-up with recent historic SLR, future projections under scenario RCP4.5 reveal that without substantial ecological recovery many reefs will not have the capacity to track SLR. Under RCP8.5, we predict that mean water depth will increase by over half a metre by 2100 across the majority of reefs. We found that coral cover strongly predicted whether a reef could track SLR, but that the majority of reefs had coral cover significantly lower than that required to prevent reef submergence. To limit reef submergence, and thus the impacts of waves and storms on adjacent coasts, climate mitigation and local impacts that reduce coral cover (e.g., local pollution and physical damage through development land reclamation) will be necessary

Constraining mid to late Holocene relative sea level change in the southern equatorial Pacific Ocean relative to the Society Islands, French Polynesia

Precisely quantifying the current climate-related sea level change requires accurate knowledge of long-term geological processes known as Glacial Isostatic Adjustments (GIA). Although the major postglacial melting phase is likely to have ended similar to 6-4 ka BP (before present), GIA is still significantly affecting the present-day vertical position of the mean sea surface and the sea bottom. Here we present empirical rsl (relative sea level) data based on U/Th dated fossil corals from reef platforms of the Society Islands, French Polynesia, together with the corresponding GIA-modeling. Fossil coral data constrain the timing and amplitude of rsl variations after the Holocene sea level maximum (HSLM). Upon correction for isostatic island subsidence, we find that local rsl was at least similar to 1.560.4 m higher than present at similar to 5.4 ka. Later, minor amplitude variations occurred until similar to 2 ka, when the rsl started dropping to its present position with a rate of similar to 0.4 mm/yr. The data match with predicted rsl curves based on global ice-sheet chronologies confirming the role of GIA-induced ocean siphoning effect throughout the mid to late Holocene. A long lasting Late Holocene highstand superimposed with second-order amplitudinal fluctuations as seen from our data suggest that the theoretical predicted timing of rsl change can still be refined pending future calibration

Reefs (Biogenic)

Reefs are in situ organic deposits which exhibit different sizes from few cubic meters to several hundreds of kilometers length and even several hundreds of meters in thickness (Spalding et al., 2001). Modern reefs are formed predominantly by stony corals which is the equivalent of the taxonomic order Scleractinia. Corals and other calcifying organisms produce hard skeletons, which lead to the accumulation of biogenic carbonates as a result of individual growth, bioerosion, sedimentation, and cementation due to wave energy during several hundreds of years. On millennial and much longer timescales, sea-level changes are the major driving force of reef growth. Today coral reefs cover more than 284,000 km2 (Spalding et al., 2001) and they are the largest marine structures on earth formed by biota, having a long geological record and ..

Coral Li/Ca in micro-structural domains as a temperature proxy

Coral skeletons are valuable geochemical archives of environmental change, although coral physiology has to varying degrees imprinted a \u2018vital effect\u2019 complicating paleoclimate reconstructions. In order to decipher environmental from physiological effects we have utilised high sensitivity laser ablation ICPMS to examine Li/Ca variations in the aragonite theca of living specimens of shallow (C. caespitosa) and deep-water (L. pertusa) corals at different temperature depth regimes, together with samples cultured in temperaturecontrolled tanks. The Li/Ca variations at micron-resolution are large and correlated with centres of calcification versus fibrous aragonite. The Li/Ca composition of the fibrous aragonite however appears to be primarily controlled by water temperature with the distribution coefficients (DLi/Ca) of L. pertusa rapidly decreasing with increasing water temperature indicating a stronger sensitivity for Li/Ca at lower temperatures, whereas the DLi/Ca for C. caespitosa follows an exponential regression. The application of coral Li/Ca paleothermometry on specifically identified micro-structural domains thus offers a unique opportunity to reconstruct changes in water temperatures at different depths in the water column