The Global Plankton Database: an inventory and data from the Former Soviet Union expeditions

At present time, there is a lack of knowledge on the interannual climate-related variability of zooplankton communities of the tropical Atlantic, central Mediterranean Sea, Caspian Sea, and Aral Sea, due to the absence of appropriate databases. In the mid latitudes, the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) is the dominant mode of atmospheric fluctuations over eastern North America, the northern Atlantic Ocean and Europe. Therefore, one of the issues that need to be addressed through data synthesis is the evaluation of interannual patterns in species abundance and species diversity over these regions in regard to the NAO. The database has been used to investigate the ecological role of the NAO in interannual variations of mesozooplankton abundance and biomass along the zonal array of the NAO influence. Basic approach to the proposed research involved: (1) development of co-operation between experts and data holders in Ukraine, Russia, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, UK, and USA to rescue and compile the oceanographic data sets and release them on CD-ROM, (2) organization and compilation of a database based on FSU cruises to the above regions, (3) analysis of the basin-scale interannual variability of the zooplankton species abundance, biomass, and species diversity.

Helium concentrations of late Miocene sediments

Throughout the history of the Solar System, Earth has been bombarded by interplanetary dust particles (IDPs), which are asteroid and comet fragments of diameter 1-1,000 µm. The IDP flux is believed to be in quasi-steady state: particles created by episodic main belt collisions or cometary fragmentation replace those removed by comminution, dynamical ejection, and planetary or solar impact. Because IDPs are rich in 3He, seafloor sediment 3He concentrations provide a unique means of probing the major events that have affected the IDP flux and its source bodies over geological timescales (Farley et al., 1998, doi:10.1126/science.280.5367.1250; Takayanagi and Ozima, 1987, doi:10.1029/JB092iB12p12531; Farley, 1995, doi:10.1038/376153a0; Kortenkamp and Dermott, 1998, doi:10.1126/science.280.5365.874). Here we report that collisional disruption of the >150-km-diameter asteroid that created the Veritas family 8.3 +/- 0.5 Myr ago (Nesvorny et al., 2003, doi:10.1086/374807) also produced a transient increase in the flux of interplanetary dust-derived 3He. The increase began at 8.2 +/- 0.1 Myr ago, reached a maximum of 4 times pre-event levels, and dissipated over 1.5 Myr. The terrestrial IDP accretion rate was overwhelmingly dominated by Veritas family fragments during the late Miocene. No other event of this magnitude over the past 10**8 yr has been deduced from main belt asteroid orbits. One remarkably similar event is present in the 3He record 35 Myr ago, but its origin by comet shower (Farley et al., 1998, doi:10.1126/science.280.5367.1250) or asteroid collision (Tagle and Claeys, 2004, doi:10.1126/science.1098481) remains uncertain.