Sea-floor images from during POLARSTERN cruise ANT-XV/3 to the Weddell Sea, Antarctica

Transects of a Remotely Operated Vehicle (ROV) providing sea-bed videos and photographs were carried out during POLARSTERN expedition ANT-XV/3 focussing on the ecology of benthic assemblages on the Antarctic shelf in the South-Eastern Weddell Sea. The ROV-system sprint 103 was equiped with two video- and one still camera, lights, flash-lights, compass, and parallel lasers providing a scale in the images, a tether-management system (TMS), a winch, and the board units. All cameras used the same main lense and could be tilted. Videos were recorded in Betacam-format and (film-)slides were made by decision of the scientific pilot. The latter were mainly made under the aspect to improve the identification of organisms depicted in the videos because the still photographs have a much higher optical resolution than the videos. In the photographs species larger than 3 mm, in the videos larger than 1 cm are recognisable and countable. Under optimum conditions the transects were strait; the speed and direction of the ROV were determined by the drift of the ship in the coastal current, since both, the ship and the ROV were used as a drifting system; the option to operate the vehicle actively was only used to avoide obstacles and to reach at best a distance of only approximately 30 cm to the sea-floor. As a consequence the width of the photographs in the foreground is approximately 50 cm. Deviations from this strategy resulted mainly from difficult ice- and weather conditions but also from high current velocity and local up-welling close to the sea-bed. The sea-bed images provide insights into the general composition of key species, higher systematic groups and ecological guilds. Within interdisciplinary approaches distributions of assemblages can be attributed to environmental conditions such as bathymetry, sediment characteristics, water masses and current regimes. The images also contain valuable information on how benthic species are associated to each other. Along the transects, small- to intermediate-scaled disturbances, e.g. by grounding icebergs were analysed and further impact to the entire benthic system by local succession of recolonisation was studied. This information can be used for models predicting the impact of climate change to benthic life in the Southern Ocean. All these approaches contribute to a better understanding of the fiunctioning of the benthic system and related components of the entire Antarctic marine ecosystem. Despite their scientific value the imaging methods meet concerns about the protection of sensitive Antarctic benthic systems since they are non-invasive and they also provide valuable material for education and outreach purposes.

P. Ovidii Nasonis Metamorphoseon libri XV /

Mode of access: Internet.

Geography anatomiz'd or The geographical grammar : being a short and exact analysis of the whole body of modern geography after a new and curious method ... /

Mode of access: Internet.

Ilias: id est, de rebus ad Trojam gestis.

Latin and Greek on opposite pages.

M. Benj. Hederici Lexicon manuale græcum, omnibus sui generis lexicis, quæ quidem exstant, longe locupletius, eaque ratione in tres partes, videlicet hermeneuticam, analyticam & syntheticam divisum; ut prima vocum græcarum ordine alphabetico se excipientium interpretationem latinam; altera difficiliorum ex iisdem, quæ in scriptoribus cum aliis, tum iis præcipue occurrunt, qui juventuti in scholis prælegi solent, resolutionem grammaticam; & tertia vocum phrasiumque latinarum, quæ in primis e re græce quidpiam reddituris esse possunt, interpretationem graecam exhibeat. Recensitum & plurimum auctum a Sam. Patrick.

Signatures: [A]-6K⁴ (6K4 advts.)

Terence's comedies made English, with his life, and some remarks at the end. By Mr. Laurence Eckard, and others. Revis'd and corrected by Dr. Eckard, and Sir R. L'Estrange.

First edition published 1694.

Geography anatomiz'd: or, The geographical grammar. Being a short and exact analysis of the whole body of modern geography, after a new and curious method ...

Mode of access: Internet.

The history of the Saracens : containing the lives of Abubeker, Omar, Othman, Ali, Hlafan, Moawiyah I. Yezid I. Moawiyah II. Abdolla, Merwan I. and Abdolmelick, the immediate successors of Mahomet. Giving an account of their most remarkable battles, sieges, &c. ... /

"Sentences of Ali, son-in-law of Mahomet, and his fourth successor, translated from an authentick Arabick manuscript ... by Simon Ockley." (19 p., v. 2) has separate t.-p.

Locomotor performance of closely related Tropidurus species: relationships with physiological parameters and ecological divergence

Tropidurid lizards have colonized a variety of Brazilian open environments without remarkable morphological variation, despite ecological and structural differences among habitats used. This study focuses on two Tropidurus sister-species that, despite systematic proximity and similar morphology, exhibit great ecological divergence and a third ecologically generalist congeneric species providing an outgroup comparison. We quantified jumping capacity and sprint speed of each species on sand and rock to test whether ecological divergence was also accompanied by differences in locomotor performance. Relevant physiological traits possibly associated with locomotor performance metabolic scopes and fiber type composition, power output and activity of the enzymes citrate synthase, pyruvate kinase and lactate dehydrogenase of the iliofibularis muscle - were also compared among the three Tropidurus species. We found that the two sister-species exhibited remarkable differences in jumping performance, while Tropidurus oreadicus, the more distantly related species, exhibited intermediate values. Tropidurus psamonastes, a species endemic to sand dunes, exhibited high absolute sprint speeds on sand, jumped rarely and possessed a high proportion of glycolytic fibers and low activity of citrate synthase. The sister-species Tropidurus itambere, endemic to rocky outcrops, performed a large number of jumps and achieved lower absolute sprint speed than T. psamonastes. This study provides evidence of rapid divergence of locomotor parameters between sister-species that use different substrates, which is only partially explained by variation in physiological parameters of the iliofibularis muscle.

Interindividual Differences in Leg Muscle Mass and Pyruvate Kinase Activity Correlate with Interindividual Differences in Jumping Performance of Hyla multilineata

Frog jumping is an excellent model system for examining the structural basis of interindividual variation in burst locomotor performance. Some possible factors that affect jump performance, such as total body size, hindlimb length, muscle mass, and muscle mechanical and biochemical properties, were analysed at the interindividual (intraspecies) level in the tree frog Hyla multilineata. The aim of this study was to determine which of these physiological and anatomical variables both vary between individuals and are correlated with interindividual variation in jump performance. The model produced via stepwise linear regression analysis of absolute data suggested that 62% of the interindividual variation in maximum jump distance could be explained by a combination of interindividual variation in absolute plantaris muscle mass, total hindlimb muscle mass ( excluding plantaris muscle), and pyruvate kinase activity. When body length effects were removed, multiple regression indicated that the same independent variables explained 43% of the residual interindividual variation in jump distance. This suggests that individuals with relatively large jumping muscles and high pyruvate kinase activity for their body size achieved comparatively large maximal jump distances for their body size.

Muscle metabolism during constant- and alternating-intensity exercise around critical power

Few studies have focused on the metabolic responses to alternating high- and low-intensity exercise and, specifically, compared these responses to those seen during constant-load exercise performed at the same average power output. This study compared muscle metabolic responses between two patterns of exercise during which the intensity was either constant and just below critical power (CP) or that oscillated above and below CP. Six trained males (mean +/- SD age 23.6 +/- 2.6 y) completed two 30-minute bouts of cycling (alternating and constant) at an average intensity equal to 90% of CR The intensity during alternating exercise varied between 158% CP and 73% CP. Biopsy samples from the vastus lateralis muscle were taken before (PRE), at the midpoint and end (POST) of exercise and analysed for glycogen, lactate, PCr and pH. Although these metabolic variables in muscle changed significantly during both patterns of exercise, there were no significant differences (p > 0.05) between constant and alternating exercise for glycogen (PRE: 418.8 +/- 85 vs. 444.3 +/- 70; POST: 220.5 +/- 59 vs. 259.5 +/- 126mmol.kg(-1) dw), lactate (PRE: 8.5 +/- 7.7 vs. 8.5 +/- 8.3; POST: 49.9 +/- 19.0 vs. 42.6 +/- 26.6 mmol.kg(-1)dw), phosphocreatine (PRE: 77.9 +/- 11.6 vs. 75.7 +/- 16.9; POST: 65.8 +/- 12.1 vs. 61.2 +/- 12.7mmol.kg(-1)dw) or pH (PRE: 6.99 +/- 0.12 vs. 6.99 +/- 0.08; POST: 6.86 +/- 0.13 vs. 6.85 +/- 0.06), respectively. There were also no significant differences in blood lactate responses to the two patterns of exercise. These data suggest that, when the average power output is similar, large variations in exercise intensity exert no significant effect on muscle metabolism.

The European Community and innovation policy : reorienting towards diffusion

This study aims to explore the position of diffusion oriented support mechanisms in European Community (EC) innovation policy. With the shift from the traditional linear model towards an integrative approach to innovation, the role of diffusion of technologies and knowledge, achieved greater weight. This shift in both the thinking of academic experts, and of national policy makers, induced EC policy makers to appeal for similar changes in Community innovation policy. From the mid-1980s, the Commission of the European Communities, the key actor in EC policy making, thought to move its innovation policy away from the traditional science push approach. This study shows that in the implementation of programmes for research, technology and innovation, the traditional linear model is still dominant. The core research and technological development programmes still operate from a science push concept of innovation, mainly due to their pre-competitive nature. The case of SPRINT illustrates that policy programmes with an integrated innovation perspective can be successful at Community level. However the programme operates in a relatively isolated position from overall research and technological development policy. The case of BRITE-EURAM illustrates the difficulties of collaborative research programmes, the bulk of EC support mechanisms, to move away from the traditional model. The study shows how conflicting policy objectives arising from the different policy networks that shape EC policy making, in combination with a lack of co-ordination in those policy domains, hinder the emergence of the integrated approach. Consequently EC diffusion policy, implemented from the perspective of the linear model, will have a sub-optimal impact on the competitiveness of European industries.

Physical oceanography, sea-bed photographs and videos of benthos from the Weddell Sea taken with remote operated vehicle CHEROKEE during POLARSTERN cruise ANT-XXIII/8

The marine ecosystem on the eastern shelf of the Antarctic Peninsula was surveyed 5 and 12 years after the climate-induced collapse of the Larsen A and B ice shelves. An impoverished benthic fauna was discovered, that included deep-sea species presumed to be remnants from ice-covered conditions. The current structure of various ecosystem components appears to result from extremely different response rates to the change from an oligotrophic sub-ice-shelf ecosystem to a productive shelf ecosystem. Meiobenthic communities remained impoverished only inside the embayments. On local scales, macro- and mega-epibenthic diversity was generally low, with pioneer species and typical Antarctic megabenthic shelf species interspersed. Antarctic Minke whales and seals utilised the Larsen A/B area to feed on presumably newly established krill and pelagic fish biomass. Ecosystem impacts also extended well beyond the zone of ice-shelf collapse, with areas of high benthic disturbance resulting from scour by icebergs discharged from the Larsen embayments.