Radiation: The Next Round!

The aftermath of the Japanese 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami still makes the news today. The Japanese Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant suffered a melt down after the disasters on the March 11, 2011. Environmental and public health concerns, and even government and corruption controversies surround the whole incident. All of which have validity. For the sake of science, this post will only focus on the most recent developments from the disaster that are affecting North Americans. 

Recently this moth, Canadian and U.S. scientists have detected radio active isotopes, cesium-134 and cesium-137, on the coast of Vancouver, British Columbia. The radioactive material has yet to reach the west coast of the U.S. according to Woods Hole ocean scientists. Isotopes are atoms of the same element that have different numbers of neutrons in their nuclei. For example cesium-134 has less neutrons than cesium-137. Cesium-137 has a half-life of 30 years and remains in the environment for several decades. The problem, at least right now, is cesium-134. It only has a half life of two years, but it is more toxic and can cause more problems than cesium 137. 

What makes cesium-134 bad? Currently, any detectable isotopes can be traced back to Fukushima. Surprisingly, cesium-137 has already been present in the atmosphere for decades. Besides Fukushima, sources of cesium-137 can be traced back to nuclear weapons testing overseas and all the way back to the Manhattan project. 

Scientists have been on the look out for radiation along the west coast since the wake of the disaster. All of the cesium-134 was concentrated in the upper 100m of the ocean according to the most recent tests. The results from the February 2014 sampling will be ready soon.  

Despite how scary this all sounds, it is still to early to tell how this will affect certain things. Also, the levels scientists are detecting are very minimal and are not high enough to cause any harm. The infamous Chernobyl disaster released 1000s of times more radiation than what is currently being detected. Currently, scientists are monitoring the Fukushima radiation closely and diligently. Just like the Bluewater Horizon disaster, the management of the Fukushima disaster is a giant science experiment because nothing like this has ever happened before. 

Fukushima's radiation reached coastal Canada first due to the Kuroshio Current. This is a powerful current that flows from Japan across the Pacific. In time, the current and the radiation it is carrying will flow downy he coast of North American and circle back toward Hawaii. This is however, only predictions based of models of the current. To this day, radioactive materials are still leaking into the water and are being carried across the ocean to North America. 

Article Source: http://local.msn.com/fukushimas-radioactive-ocean-water-arrives-at-west-coast

Radulas and oysters

After talking about the various lethal things that gastropods do with their radulas, I thought you might like this post from the Deep Sea News.

And check out this video on the blue crab fishery in North Carolina:

Ocean Conveyer in the news

The ice caps are melting, and we are all still probably doomed.  But the textbook version of the Great Ocean Conveyer may need some fine-tuning.  The release of floats in the deep Atlantic counter current (below the Gulf Stream) shows that this water may not move as predicted.  The new understanding of this current will lead to revised models for Conveyer flow and its effects on global climate.

And remember DDT, the once popular insecticide banned in the 1970 due to its propensity to thin bird egg shells and other various toxic effects.  Apparently lots of it was sucked down into the conveyer, and it is now slowly being released back into the atmosphere.

Can animals mix the ocean?

You might think that it takes some pretty big forces to have a significant effect on water movement in the ocean.  The sun and moon, winds, temperature and salinity produce tides, waves and currents, and in turn affect primary production and the distribution of species.  But what effects do marine animals themselves have on the mixing of ocean water?  Quite a bit, according to a recent paper in Nature.

Check out the video:

The geology behind the tragic Haitian earthquake

The Christian Science Monitor had an excellent piece yesterday on the complicated geology of Hispaniola, the island shared by Haiti and the Dominican Republic.  Two strike-slip faults, similar to the famous San Andreas fault of California, run through Haiti due to the movements of the North American and Caribbean Plates.  While the Easterly Lesser Antilles were formed due to subduction of the more dense North American Plate under the Caribbean plate, both plates are of equal density near Hispaniola, leading to a slip fault instead.  Built up pressure in the fault led to this week's terrible earthquake, and further research is needed to better understand and predict future movements of these faults.