Search Results for: ocean

A European team of researchers has demonstrated that sediment is transported to the deep sea via canyons in the seabed. The sediment accumulates in the head of the submarine canyons. At the end of the canyons, mud avalanches disperse into the deep sea. Scientists from the Netherlands Institute for Sea Research (NIOZ) presented their findings at an international congress held from 7 to 10 April 2002.

With bottom landers, onboard the ship R.V. Pelagia, the researchers explored the Nazaré Canyo

Two cricket-like creatures establish new insect group.

The first new order of insects to be discovered for more than 80 years has emerged from the mountains of Namibia. The order’s first official members are two creatures about 2 cm long that look a bit like a cross between a cricket and a stick insect 1 .

The group, called Mantophasmatodea, joins the other 30 or so insect orders such as beetles, flies and termites. “If it was in mammals it’d be like

How do turtles survive long trips across the ocean? At the Society for Experimental Biology conference on Friday 12 April Ms Corinne Martin (University of Wales Swansea) will present evidence of energy-saving diving patterns adopted by green turtles to survive long ocean trips.

The turtles breed at Ascension Island, undertaking long-distance migrations greater than 2 300 km between the island and their feeding grounds on the Brazilian coast. During their trip across the ocean they don’t feed

Deserts covered Central Asia as early as 22 million years ago

The great Asian deserts developed 22 million years ago at the latest, 14 million years earlier than had been thought. So concludes a new analysis of Chinese soils, filling in another piece of the puzzle of the Himalayas’ birth.

Today, huge deserts characterize the vast landmasses inside Asia, the largest continent on Earth. Here, cut off by the Himalayas from the humidity of the Indian Ocean and far from any othe

A robot submarine expedition under the Antarctic sea ice has discovered a major food reserve in the Southern Ocean. The findings, reported this week in SCIENCE, show a dense band of the shrimp-like krill under the ice, five times more concentrated than in open water. The importance of sea ice as a nursery for krill – key food for penguins, whales and fish – has long been suspected, but these are the first large scale measurements.

Scientists from the British Antarctic Survey, the Open Univer

Ancestors of the flightless figurehead of extinction island-hopped.

The flightless dodo’s ungainly shape hid an island-hopping past, say researchers. DNA from the extinct bird has revealed its place in the pigeon family tree, and suggests how it came to end up on its home, and graveyard, the island of Mauritius 1 .

The dodo’s strange appearance led to centuries of wrangling over its ancestry. “It’s the figurehead of extinction, yet little is known about its e