RESUMO
The increasing numbers and types of potential pollutants in the world oceans calls for novel strategies for their assays. The 'Mussel Watch' well served the latter decades of the 20th century. For the immediate future, individual assays of the chemicals of concern should be replaced by the analyses of groups of pollutants which have a common impact upon marine organisms. Secondly, more attention should be focussed upon the benthos where many potential pollutants continue to accumulate. Impacts upon members of the marine biosphere may be recognized by population changes of individual species. Lastly, time frame monitoring studies should be initiated, so that long-term trends in the health of a system can be detected.
Assuntos
Monitoramento Ambiental/métodos , Poluição da Água , Animais , Bivalves , California , Sistema Enzimático do Citocromo P-450/biossíntese , Ecossistema , Estrogênios não Esteroides/toxicidade , Sedimentos Geológicos/análise , Hidrocarbonetos Policíclicos Aromáticos/toxicidade , Fatores de Tempo , Poluentes Químicos da Água/toxicidadeRESUMO
Unusual submarine rocks consisting of barite, opal, and volcanic detritus were recovered from the Lau Basin northeast of Australia. It is proposed that these rocks were formed when hydrothermal solutions emanating from a fracture zone offsetting the active spreading center in the Lau Basin came into contact with cooler ocean waters.
RESUMO
The combustion of the fossil fuels coal, oil, and lignite potentially can mobilize many elements into the atmosphere at rates, in general, less than but comparable to their rates of flow through natural waters during the weathering cycle. Since the principal sites of fossil fuel combustion are in the mid-latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere, changes in the composition of natural waters and air, as a consequence of this activity, will be most evident at these latitudes.
