Tuesday, March 25, 2008

Carbon or bust!

I thought you folks might be excited to hear about what I'm doing research on in my grad school research. Ok, considering words like "organic," "particulates," and "degradation rates" are involved, excited might be the wrong word....interested? mildly curious? Ok, fine, maybe you don't care at all, but that's just too bad. I'm going to attempt to make my research topic mildly interesting to all you people who don't think studying ocean mud is the be-all and end-all of coolness.

The first thing to understand is that when fancy phrases like "degradation of phytoplankton-derived organic matter" (title of the paper I'm currently reading) get thrown around, what we're really saying is "CARBON!!! We're studying carbon over here!!" Now, with all the human sources of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, the question of where that carbon may or may not be going is a very important one. Scientists think that the oceans serve as a giant carbon sink, absorbing a lot of the carbon being released into the atmosphere. (At the moment they can only account for 50% of the carbon we humans have released. The other half has to be going somewhere....) Understanding if the ocean is in fact a giant carbon sponge, and how it might go about doing that sponging are huge areas of research in oceanography these days.

Now, some definitions:

organic - We're not talking organic food here. Think chemistry. Organic molecules are those which contain carbon and hydrogen (along with all kinds of other things like nitrogen, phosphorous, and other stuff). Organic compounds are often created by living creatures - fats, sugars, proteins, etc.

particulates - anything bigger than .45 micrometers (that's really really small). Anything smaller than that is considered to be dissolved. Now, by anything bigger, I do mean anything. Yes, even whales can be considered particulates. Not typically the type of particle I'll catch in my filtration system, but that's beside the point.

Now, a lot of carbon absorption happens through biology - through photosynthesis, specifically. That good old story about CO2 getting turned into sugars by plants. For that reason, we're generally most interested in organic carbon, because that is the type that is being readily drawn out of the atmosphere and stored in other forms. Now, when our friendly plant cells (algae) or the things that eat them (animals of various types) die, their cells drift down to the bottom of the ocean. And if we're lucky, those cells and all the organic carbon they contain get buried before something wanders along and eats them, effectively removing them from the current carbon cycle. Fast forward several million years, and poof! Those buried cells have become fossil fuels.
Ironic, isn't it?

So, what are scientists trying to understand? Well, since we really know hardly anything, there's lots left to ask: How quickly does the process I just described happen in today's ocean? Are there areas where it happens more quickly? How do different species of algae and animals affect the system? Are there other factors (like the presence of nutrients) that can speed up/slow down the process? How much of the organic carbon formed actually gets buried instead of eaten and re-released to the atmosphere?

Basically, to try and get anything remotely resembling an accurate carbon budget for the planet, we need a much better grasp on all of those questions, and many questions that we haven't even thought to ask yet. Hence why I'm trying to contribute my two cents to the effort.

Wednesday, March 19, 2008

Bone Eating Snot Flowers

Whales are huge. (That's a scientific fact.) So have you ever wondered what happens when a whale dies (of natural causes)? That's a lot of meat to just be floating out in the ocean somewhere. Well, first of all they don't float. Whale carcasses sink quickly to the deep ocean floor, and provide a veritable feast for anything that comes along. Initially, large organisms like hagfish and sleeper sharks scavenge the carcass, but some of the more interesting critters come later.

Once the whale is stripped to the bones other, more inventive organisms come along to take advantage of the windfall. One of those is Osedax mucofloris, the bone eating snot flower. It's actually a worm, not a flower, but it doesn't have any form of gut. Instead it has a symbiotic bacteria that digests the lipids in whale bone after the worms themselves have buried into the skeleton. I know, it's all sort of morbid, but tell me that isn't cool. Really.

Monday, March 17, 2008

/sigh....why me?

Having not heard anything from the Mac store on the status of the new computer, I decided to stop in and see what was going on. It turns out that Apple had the wrong information connected with the serial number of my computer. So they thought it was a giant tower instead of a laptop, and said they couldn't fix the problem 'cause that type of machine doesn't have the problem being described by the store techs... After several days of back and forth arguing, Apple was convinced that my laptop was in fact a laptop, and they can fix it. Sadly, all this delay means it won't be back in Corvallis until the beginning of next week. /Sigh.

Sunday, March 16, 2008

The Seafood Rant

There appears to be some confusion regarding the contents of my last post, and the implication that I said there's unlimited amounts of seafood for certain midwestern boys to eat. /Glares at Jason and Eli with the fury of a thousand suns. I thought I'd take this opportunity to clarify that YOU MAY NOT EAT ANY SHRIMP!!! I've become rather famous for my rant regarding shrimp. Don't get me wrong, I love shrimp. They're nummy. But there are too many problems surrounding their raising and/or capture for me to be comfortable eating your average grocery store/restaurant shrimp.

I am not actually going to go into the shrimp rant at the moment. Rather, I want to point out what some of the bigger issues are that surround seafood as a whole. There are a number of things to take into account. Here are a few main ones:

1. Overall sustainability of the fishery (ie - are we taking more fish than are being replaced?)
2. Bycatch - in some industries (/cough shrimping /cough), well over 50% of the stuff being caught is not the target species. All that extra goes to waste.
3. Habitat destruction - bottom trawlers absolutely destroy habitats (hmm....shrimp again)

Farming seafood also has it's own set of problems, including additional habitat destruction, waste management, and diseases. Really, it's all a lot to keep track of. Fortunately for we innocent bystanders who just want to eat some fish, the Monterey Bay Aquarium has put together lists of seafood do's an don't's based on the region of the country you live in. I HIGHLY recommend you check it out: http://www.mbayaq.org/cr/seafoodwatch.asp

In all seriousness, the world's fisheries are in bad shape. There is a substantial amount of evidence that ALL of the world's fisheries may collapse within the next 40 years, do largely to a combination of poor management practices and other pressures, like pollution. I really really hope that doesn't happen. In the meanwhile, we can contribute by supporting those fisheries who are doing it "right"...or at least more right (wild caught Alaskan salmon and halibut, for example), and choosing not to support those who are unnecessarily damaging (orange roughy, shrimp, swordfish, etc). Alright, I'm done being on my soapbox now.

Thursday, March 13, 2008

Coriolis --> Upwelling --> Nomnomnoms

Now that we all understand that whole Coriolis curving-in-a-straight-line-spinning thing, we can talk about upwelling. Upwelling is life. It is the reason that Oregon is rich in, well, pretty much everything of a marine nature. Ok, so we don't have a lot of penguins. Or polar bears. Clearly there just isn't enough Coke here. A complete aside, the whole penguin-polar bear Coke commercials drive me NUTS!!! Has no one pointed out to those advertisement goofballs that penguins live at the South Pole and polar bears live at the North Pole?!? I mean, come on people. Only like...you know, 12,436 miles in between there.

So, upwelling...here's the story. During the summer months, the west coast of the US gets wind blowing from north to south right along shore. This pushes the water out towards the open ocean. If you just did a mental double take, it's ok. Yes, a wind to the south blows the water west (well, south-west technically). That whole Coriolis thing is screwing with the natural order of things. The wind starts to move the water south, but because the earth is spinning, it all starts to curve to the right.

The water actually moves southwest, away from the shore line, leaving a "gap" behind. Clearly there aren't actually any gaps in the ocean. The "space" that is created as the water is blown away from shore is filled by water being pulled up along the bottom from WAY the heck down off the continental shelf. (Think several kilometers deep). This is upwelling. That water carries high concentrations of nutrients that have been collecting in the deep ocean. Nutrients + sunlight = LOTS of algae growth. The growing algae provides an abundant food source for a wealth of marine critters. This is what has always given Oregon such a rich fishery. We have salmon, rockfish, lingcod, crab, shrimp, clams...nomnomnom. Unfortunately we don't have large quantities of some of these things anymore, but that's a rant that'll have to wait for another day.

There's another very important thing to know about upwelling in Oregon. You do NOT want to swim in our ocean during the summer for extended periods of time without a wet suit. I'd recommend October or November for that. Our water is colder during the summer than during the winter thanks to all the deep water getting pulled up to shore.

Wednesday, March 12, 2008

Yes, Mulder was actually wrong once...

So, I remember this episode of the X-Files when Mulder and Scully were tracking down some sort of devil teacher at a school. Mulder goes to get a drink from the drinking fountain and notices that the water is draining counter-clockwise. He promptly informs Scully and cites it as an indication of a nearby demonic presence, because water always drains clockwise in the northern hemisphere due to the Coriolis force. I'm sorry, Mulder, but you're just wrong. The Coriolis force has NO BEARING on the direction that water drains either in a drinking fountain or in a toilet. (Lisa Simpson is another important cultural figure who has misinterpreted this remarkable phenomenon.)

As I'm sure you clever folks have figured out, I'm giving a little lesson on Coriolis today, one of my favorite subjects in oceanography. (This is all within the scope of trying to tell you all a little more about what's going on in my life. At the moment, Rachel's life = school school school school. However, I didn't really think you'd want to hear about the nuances of my arguments with MatLab, and how I'd like to smash my computer into a wall on a regular basis. So instead, you get to learn about my favorite parts of this whole oceanography business.) Without Coriolis, the oceans wouldn't circulate the way they do and the earth's climate would be completely different than what we have. There would be no ocean gyres, and large scale cyclones (think giant storm cells like the ones that plaster the midwest with snow) would not happen the way they so.

So, what the story? Well, the thing is, the Earth is spinning. I know, you're all tempted to go /palmface and say "well, duh," but that's really the key to the whole story. We are standing on a rotating reference frame, and that completely changes the way things appear to move from our perspective. When you are in a rotating reference frame and attempt to move something in a straight line, it will appear to curve to one side or the other (depending on which direction your reference frame is spinning. In the case of the earth, which is spinning counter-clockwise, things curve to the right. If you're in the northern hemisphere. Hence Mulder's delusion about the drain.) The word appear is very important, because the kicker of Coriolis is that if you abruptly stop the spinning reference frame, you'll discover that the object in question is actually moving in a perfectly straight line. It is just the movement of the reference frame that makes it appear to curve or spin. (So, if the Earth stopped spinning, we'd find that the large ocean gyres are in fact giant sloshing pools that move back and forth with no spin at all.)

So, some important points about Coriolis:

1) It's strength is dependent on latitude. There is NO Coriolis at the equator, but the farther you go toward the poles, the stronger the effect. (To give you a visual, if you are standing still on the equator, the movement of the earth is carrying you in a straight line - you're not actually spinning at all. If you're standing still directly on one of the poles, the movement of the planet causes you to spin like a top. Therefore, no Coriolis at the equator, lots of Coriolis at the poles.)

2) It is an important force over large scales of time and space. Coriolis is an acceleration, so the longer the time spent under its influence, the more noticeable the effect.

3) The effect is more noticeable on something moving slowly over a distance than on something moving quickly over the same distance, because it's going to take the slow moving object longer to get from point A to point B, and time is what will really determine the magnitude of curvage experienced.

4) While Coriolis is a powerful force on our planet, it is not particularly strong. Meaning that is is easily counteracted by other forces, like pressure gradients and friction. This is particularly true on small scales.

This leads to why the Coriolis force really has nothing to do with the toilet/water fountain:

1) The water is moving too quickly

2) A toilet bowl is not exactly a large spatial scale

3) In both cases, the water is already being pushed a specific direction. There's no way Coriolis can counteract that.

Now, I know that this is a lot of information, but here's the take home message for today: in the northern hemisphere, the Coriolis force causes a moving object to curve to the right. In the southern hemisphere, things curve to the left. If you're questioning why this is at all relevant to your life, and thinking that perhaps listening to Rachel ramble like a mad scientist is in fact a waste of your time, then check back tomorrow. Because without Coriolis, the planet we know and love would be a very very different place.

Tuesday, March 11, 2008

The Dead Zone

Yesterday I spent most of my day researching and writing a paper about hypoxia, a topic of oceanography that isn't terribly well understood. Here's a brief synopsis of the situation:

Hypoxia occurs when the level of dissolved oxygen in ocean water drops low enough to be harmful to life in the area. These low oxygen areas are not permanent features on the coast - they occur during the summer upwelling season. At that time, large amounts of nutrients are brought to the ocean surface, allowing phytoplankton to bloom. Eventually that growing phytoplankton will die, and their cells will be decomposed by microbes. That decomposition process is what draws down oxygen levels. Too much phytoplankton = no oxygen.

Hypoxia was never observed off of the Oregon coast until the summer of 2002, and has been getting steadily worse over the last few years. In August 2006, hypoxia progressed to full anoxia, meaning that the water was completely devoid of oxygen. This anoxic area caused a huge die-off in macrofauna - the big stuff we can see, primarily crabs in this case. Researchers took video along a transect line off of Cape Perpetua during the summers of 2001 and 2006. The difference is quite dramatic.

Researchers are still trying to understand what is causing Oregon's hypoxia, as it's a very new feature of out ocean. It appears that it is linked to global climate change through changing wind patterns. Our summer winds are what control upwelling, and changing them will change the overall dynamic of the near-shore ecosystem.

If you're interested in learning more, the PISCO website on hypoxia is a great place to start.

Monday, March 10, 2008

Lament of the Computers

I'm having computer challenges. I have two old computers, both of which are on their last legs. Between the two of them, I can usually do everything I need to or want to, although it often involves negotiating two mice and keyboards, 'cause half of what I'm doing is on one computer and half is on the other. It's pretty ridiculous. I mean, program A is now broken on the Beast, but works on the iMac, but only in some situations. Program B is broken on the iMac but works on the Beast.

On top of all this, the Beast was starting to have computer seizures, which mostly involved complete screen freakouts in neon colors and streaks and shapes that resemble what I can only imagine a really bad acid trip might be like.

So, I bought a new computer. A beautiful MacBook Pro that is sitting like an idol in a special place on my desk. And now, one week after receiving it (and, conveniently enough, right after I transferred all of my music permissions etc to that computer), it has gone into a computer coma. It's an electronic vegetable. So now I'm back to negotiation between the iMac and the Beast, but I can't listen to most of my music, and a bunch of new files for school that I had downloaded are on life support just waiting for someone to pull the plug.

Sigh. Time for a trip to the Mac store.

Saturday, March 8, 2008

Ok, here goes nothing...

So, thanks to the poking of one Zeibs, I've been prompted to start a new blog. How, you ask, will this be different from my old blog?

1) It will talk about aspects of my life aside from extensive amounts of time spent at the end of the world.
2) I will actually, you know, do some writing every once in a while (besides when I'm waiting for planes to land in the fog).

So, to start with... I am currently living in Corvallis, Oregon. By "in" I really mean about 14 miles south and west of town in the foothills of Oregon's Coast Range. I'm sharing a house with a woman named Tamara and her two black labs, Tolly and Ace (aka Thing 1 and Thing 2).

I'm just finishing my second quarter of graduate school at Oregon State University in Oceanography. Chemical Oceanography, to be specific. Given that I majored in biology and spent four years studying fur seals and sea birds, I occassionally look around and think "How did I get here again? Seals? Carbon particulates? It makes sesnse, right?"

Despite getting my ass kicked for a large part of the last few months, I love grad school, love my program, love my classmates, and love my living situation. Really, life is good.