Two New Species Of Soft Coral Discovered In Caribbean

ScienceDaily (Dec. 21, 2007) — Two new species of soft corals were discovered during an October expedition to Saba Bank, Netherlands Antilles, the largest atoll in the Caribbean. Herman Wirshing, a graduate student from the University of Miami Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science's Biology and Fisheries Division, joined leading coral reef experts from Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi (TAM-CC), and the Universidad de los Andes in Columbia, to help identify and quantify soft coral and crustacean species on the Bank.
The team collected 40 species of soft corals and nearly 100 different species of crustaceans in just ten days of SCUBA diving and exploration. One of the likely new species was found in deep water (70 m), and the other, surprisingly, was found to be common in shallow water (20 m).

“Since the gorgonians of the Caribbean are a well-known group of corals with only a limited number of species, the discovery of a new species in the shallowest parts of the Bank was quite unexpected,” said Peter Etnoyer, a gorgonian expert from the Harte Research Institute (HRI) at TAMU-CC, and the researcher who asked Wirshing to participate in this expedition. Wirshing concludes, “we will have to do more work to carefully verify and describe all of the diagnostic characteristics of this new shallow water gorgonian, but we can already conclude that it belongs to the genus Pterogorgia, in which so far only three species are known.”

The expedition is part of an ongoing effort from the Department of the Environment of the Netherlands Antilles (MINA) to develop a sound management plan for the Bank. With funding from USONA, the organization that distributes development funding from the Netherlands, a project was started in June of this year to collect as much knowledge as possible about the Bank. The effort is built upon previous work in the region, including the first rapid assessment expedition by Conservation International in 2006 (which also contributed a representative to this expedition) surveys by the Dutch Hydrographic Service in 2006 and a yearlong fisheries survey conducted in 2000.

Project leader Paul Hoetjes of MINA is hopeful that by the end of the year a well-structured draft of the proposed management plan and legislation to support it, as well as a finalized proposal to the International Maritime Organization (IMO) will be prepared. The goal is to have the Saba Bank designated as a Particularly Sensitive Sea Area (PSSA), which will help to regulate shipping over the parts of the Bank that lie outside the territorial waters of Saba, but are still located within the Exclusive Economic Zone of the Netherlands Antilles.

Dr. Juan Sanchez of the Universidad de los Andes in Columbia, a leading expert on gorgonian corals and crustaceans, Dr. Thomas Shirley, Endowed Chair of Biodiversity and Conservation Science of HRI at TAMU-CC, also participated in the expedition. The data and samples collected from this cruise will provide an important baseline of present crustacean species on which future changes in the ecosystem can be measured.

“This expedition to the Saba Bank was not only an excellent opportunity to demonstrate both qualitatively and quantitatively the rich biodiversity of this relatively unexplored area, but also to work with some of the world's leading experts in gorgonian and crustacean biology, as well as government organizations to help build and maintain a more sustainable and thriving ecosystem in the area,” said Wirshing.

Wirshing is currently a Ph.D. student studying molecular systematics of hard corals and gorgonian corals with Rosenstiel professor, Dr. Andrew Baker. His research will help scientists better understand the natural history and diversity of hard and soft coral ecosystems.

Adapted from materials provided by University of Miami.

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Wind Turbines Produce 'Green' Energy And Airflow Mysteries

ScienceDaily (Dec. 20, 2007) — Using smoke, laser light, model airplane propellers and a campus wind tunnel, a team led by Johns Hopkins University researchers is trying to solve the airflow mysteries that surround wind turbines, an increasingly popular source of “green” energy. The National Science Foundation recently awarded the team a three-year, $321,000 grant to support the project.

The rise in oil prices and a growing demand for energy from non-polluting sources has led to a global boom in construction of tall wind turbines that convert the power of moving air into electricity. The technology of these devices has improved dramatically in recent years, making wind energy more attractive. For example, Denmark is able to produce about 20 percent of its electric energy through wind turbines.

But important questions remain: Could large wind farms, whipping up the air with massive whirling blades, alter local weather conditions? Could changing the arrangement of these turbines lead to even more efficient power production? The researchers from Johns Hopkins and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute hope their work will help answer such questions.

“With diameters spanning up to 100 meters across, these wind turbines are the largest rotating machines ever built,” said research team leader Charles Meneveau, a turbulence expert in Johns Hopkins’ Whiting School of Engineering.

“There’s been a lot of research done on wind turbine blade aerodynamics, but few people have looked at the way these machines interact with the turbulent wind conditions around them. By studying the airflow around small, scale-model windmills in the lab, we can develop computer models that tell us more about what’s happening in the atmosphere at full-size wind farms.”

To collect data for such models, Meneveau’s team is conducting experiments in a campus wind tunnel. The tunnel uses a large fan to generate a stream of air moving at about 40 mph. Before it enters the testing area, the air passes through an “active grid,” a curtain of perforated plates that rotate randomly and create turbulence so that air currents in the tunnel more closely resemble real-life wind conditions. The air currents then pass through a series of small model airplane propellers mounted atop posts, mimicking an array of full-size wind turbines.

The researchers gather information on the interaction of the air currents and the model turbines by using a high-tech procedure called stereo particle-image-velocimetry. First, they “seed” the air in the tunnel with a form of smoke—tiny particles that move with the prevailing airflow. Above the model turbines, a laser generates two sheet-like pulses of light in quick succession. A camera captures the position of particles at the time of each flash. “When the images are processed, we see that there are two dots for every particle,” said Meneveau, who is the university’s Louis M. Sardella Professor of Mechanical Engineering.

“Because we know the time difference between the two laser shots, we can calculate the velocity. So we get an instantaneous snapshot of the velocity vector at each point. Having these vector maps allows us to calculate how much kinetic energy is flowing from one place to another, in much greater detail than what was possible before.”

Raul B. Cal, a Johns Hopkins postdoctoral fellow who is working on the project with Meneveau, said this data could lead to a better understanding of real wind farm conditions. “What happens when you put these wind turbines too close together or too far apart? What if you align them staggered or in parallel?” he asked. “All of these are different effects that we want to be able to comprehend and quantify, rather than just go out there and build these massive structures, implementing them and not knowing what’s going to happen.”

Meneveau pointed out that dense clusters of wind turbines also could affect nearby temperatures and humidity levels, and cumulatively, perhaps, alter local weather conditions. Highly accurate computer models will be needed to unravel the various effects involved. “Our research will provide the fluid dynamical data necessary to improve the accuracy of such computer models,” Meneveau said. “We’d better know what the effects are in order to implement wind turbine technology in the most sustainable and efficient fashion possible.”

Meneveau and Cal are collaborating with Luciano Castillo, associate professor in the Department of Mechanical, Aerospace and Nuclear Engineering at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and Hyung S. Kang, an associate research scientist in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Johns Hopkins.

The project’s funding was provided through the National Science Foundation’s Energy for Sustainability Program.

Adapted from materials provided by Johns Hopkins University.