278 results found.
... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 87: May-Jun 1993 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Is caddy a mammal?" Caddy" is short for Cadborosaurus , the speculative sea animal seen rather frequently off the British Columbia coast and as far south as Oregon. Professor P. LeBlond, University of British Columbia, recently presented a paper on Caddy at a joint meeting of the Canadian and American Societies of Zoology. Of all the supposed sea serpents, Caddy seems closest to respectability. Not only are there many sightings on record, but the remains of a 3-meterlong carcass of an apparent juvenile specimen of Caddy was discovered in the stomach of a sperm whale. Adult Caddys are about 7 meters long. "The descriptions [of Caddy] are generally similar. They suggest a long-necked beast with short pointed front flippers, a horse-like head, distinct eyes, a visible mouth and either ears or giraffe-like horns. Often Caddy is described as having hair like a seal, and sometimes a mane along its neck." Most interesting is Caddy's body hair, which implies a mammal rather than a reptile. But if it is a mammal, how does it get air, since it surfaces so rarely? Some have suggested that the giraffe-like horns are snorkels! But E. Bousfield, a colleague of LeBlond, thinks that the tubercules reported along the animal's back might be gill-like tissues that would allow a mammal to extract oxygen from seawater! With so ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 39: May-Jun 1985 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects The Tsunami Tune Tsunamis are giant sea waves set into motion by earthquakes on the sea floor. Some 322 tsunamis have been recorded in the Pacific between A.D . 83 and 1967 -- or about one every six years on the average. The surprising thing is that tsunamis are more common in November, August, and March, but rarer in July and April. Offhand, no good explanation comes to mind why sea floor quakes should favor some months over others. (Anonymous; "The Times for Tsunamis," Science News, 127:88, 1985.) From Science Frontiers #39, MAY-JUN 1985 . 1985-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... year-old American captain of the ship, shortened the sails. The Marques was carrying a crew of 28 - half of whom were under 25. At the helm, Philip Sefton, 22, fought the angry waves that now confronted them. "Suddenly a heavy gust of wind pushed the Marques down on its starboard side. At the same instant 'a freakish wave of incredible force and size,' as Sefton later described it, slammed the ship broadside, pushing its masts farther beneath the surging water. A second wave pounded the ship as it went down. The Marques filled with water and sank in less than one minute. Most of the crew were trapped as they slept below deck. Only Sefton and eight shipmates survive." Accounts such as that above are part of sea lore. Waves 50-100 feet high have been frequently reported over the years. Most often, they are encountered in rough seas, but some walls of water have smashed ships in relatively calm waters. A tanker encountering a steep-sided giant wave in the Aguhlas Current of the African coast. Until recently, oceanographers were confident that any unusually large wave was just the chance addition of two smaller waves. Now, a consensus is emerging that at least two other factors are important: seabed topography and ocean currents. To illustrate, perhaps the most dangerous stretch of water in the world lies off southeast Africa, where the fast (8 feet/second) Agulhas Current often runs into storm waves surging up from Antarctica. The African continental shelf is so shaped that it funnels the ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 109: Jan-Feb 1997 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Rogue wave smashes the queen elizabeth ii September 11, 1995. North Atlantic. Aboard the Queen Elizabeth II enroute from Cherbourg to New York. During this crossing of the Atlantic, the Queen Elizabeth II had to change course to avoid Hurricane Luis. Despite this precaution, the vessel encountered seas of 18 meters with occasional higher crests. At 0400 the Grand Lounge windows, 22 meters above the water, stove in. But this was only a precursor. "At 0410 the rogue wave was sighted right ahead, looming out of the darkness from 220 , it looked as though the ship was heading straight for the white cliffs of Dover. The wave seemed to take ages to arrive but it was probably less than a minute before it broke with tremendous force over the bow. An incredible shudder went through the ship, followed a few minutes later by two smaller shudders. There seemed to be two waves in succession as the ship fell into the 'hole' behind the first one. The second wave of 28-29 m (period 13 seconds), whilst breaking, crashed over the foredeck, carrying away the forward whistle mast. .. .. . "Captain Warwick admits that sometimes it can be difficult to gauge the height of a wave, but in this case the crest was more or less level with the line of sight for those on the bridge, about 29 m above the surface; additionally, the ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 80: Mar-Apr 1992 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Aerial Bioluminescence January 19, 1991. South China Sea. Aboard the m.v . Benavon . The vessel was heading for Singapore on a body of water noted for bioluminescent displays. Flashes of light were seen in the bow wave and the ship's wake, appearing to be both on the surface and slightly below. This type of display is rather common, but another, much rarer phenomenon was also present: In 1880 off the Malabar Coast of India, a vessel was engulfed in great waves of light floating above the sea. "At the same time as the above form of bioluminescence, there seemed to be a second type but it was difficult to pinpoint the source. The effect was that the atmosphere around the ship and extending to the horizon had some form of faint white illumination not provided by the light in the water, which was black apart from the previously described flashes. On the other hand, there was no obvious source in the sky either, which although virtually cloudless was very dark, and certainly darker than the atmosphere at the level of the ship. The only conclusion that the observers could come to was that this was a faint example of (to quote The Marine Observer's Handbook ), 'luminescence in the air a few feet above the sea surface when there is no light in the water'. This form lasted for about 30 minutes, whereas the bright flashes continued for ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 87: May-Jun 1993 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Giant impact-wave deposit along u.s . east coast Along the shore from North Carolina to Maryland and also into Chesapeake Bay, deep-sea drillers have charted the Exmore Boulder Bed. No minor deposit this; it is is over 60 meters thick in places and covers more than 15,000 square kilometers. In the bed are found boulders (up to 2 meters in diameter), cobbles, pebbles, and traces of tektite glass and shocked quartz. The youngest microfossils date from the Eocene, and argon dating of the ejecta yield a date of 35.5 million years, which correlates with the North American tektite strewn field. C.W . Poag et al interpret this boulder bed as follows: "On the basis of its unusual characteristics and its stratigraphic equivalence to a layer of impact ejecta at Deep Sea Drilling Project (DSDP) Site 612 (New Jersey continental slope), we postulate that this boulder bed was formed by a powerful bolidegenerated wave train that scoured the ancient inner shelf and coastal plain of southeastern Virginia. The most promising candidate for the bolide impact site (identified on seismic reflection profiles) is 40 km north-northwest of DSDP Site 612 on the New Jersey outer continental shelf." (Poag, C. Wylie, et al; "Deep Sea Drilling Project Site 612 Bolide Event: New Evidence of a Late Eocene Impact-Wave Deposit and a Possible Impact Site, U ...
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... Jan-Feb 2000 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Do Continents Really Drift?For geologists, Continental Drift (or "Plate Tectonics") is as vital to their scientific outlook as the Big Bang is to astronomers, or Evolution to biologists. Indeed, Continental Drift is taught as an unassailable hypothesis -- in essence, a "fact." It is, therefore, a tempting target for anomalists. Fortunately, there are some maverick geologists who are willing and able to draw up a list of arguments against the "fact" of Continental Drift. Australian P. James is one such brave soul. Here follows the abstract from one of his papers. "Anomalies in the three basic concepts of mobile plate tectonics -- sea-floor spreading, transform faults, subduction -- are analysed. The process is then extended to subsidiary aspects; sediments on a moving basement, continental evidence, mechanisms and measurements. In summation, the criticisms present a formidable and damaging document against the total framework of mobilism, both in its general concepts and it its detailed interpretations." From James' lengthy paper, we select just two anomalies that he has identified in the Atlantic where North America and Europe are supposedly drifting apart. First, repeated direct measurements of the drifting seem to be a wash; that is, there is no drift to speak of. The expansion of the Atlantic basin seems to be only 5-13 mm/year (just 20% of the predicted rate), and this is partially offset ...
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... .D . Greene wrote the following letter to Time : "Forget bubbles, comets or ocean vents. Scientists should be looking at pizza for the answer. I can remember when my college roommates and I routinely created life every week in our refrigerator. My theory is that around 4.5 billion years ago, the earth was bombarded by intergalactic pizzas. These then provided the ideal breeding ground in which early organisms could thrive and later evolve." (Greene, Mark D.; "How Life Began," Time, 142:8 , November 1, 1993.) Comment. Charles Fort would certainly have chuckled over the near-simultaneous mentions of intergalactic pizzas in two diverse publications. A second report underscores the mystery presented by the unexpected diversity of life in the deep-sea ooze. J.D . Gage and R.M . May ponder in Nature : "Why there should be such exuberant biological diversity in an environment apparently lacking in the habitat complexity of, say, tropical rain forest -- whose species richness it might rival -- remains an enigma." In fact, the enigma becomes more profound when one finds there exists a "depth effect" paralleling the terrestrial "altitude effect." "This phenomenon is associated with an increase in species richness with depth, and is essentially like the pattern of increasing numbers of plant and animal species as one moves down from mountain tops to sea level." This "depth effect" is just the opposite of what one would expect as one descends into the ever blacker, ever colder, higher ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 138: NOV-DEC 2001 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects When The Antarctic Was Warm The analyses of ocean-floor sediments deposited recently by melting Antarctic ice sheets reveal that these ice sheets are only about 2,000 years old. The evidence is in the rocky debris scraped up from inland Antarctica and then transported out to sea, where it drops to the sea floor as the ice melts. The grains of rock settle into the ocean sediments which contain biological debris that can be carbon-dated. (Marine life beneath the ice sheets is surprisingly abundant and varied despite the near-freezing temperatures.) A somewhat politically incorrect observation appears in this article. However, the news that the Antarctic Peninsula's ice shelves may have come and gone at least once since the end of the last ice age, about 11,000 years ago, suggests that people may not be fully to blame for the disappearance now underway. Supporting foregoing evidence are studies of Antarctic lake sediments and ancient abandoned penguin rookeries. Everything points to a warmer, more humid Antarctica between 2,500 and 4,000 years ago. (Perkins, S.; "Antarctic Sediments Muddy Climate Debate," Science News, 160: 150, 2001.) Comment. The warmer Antarctic just portrayed might explain those old maps, such as that of Piri Re'is, that seem to depict a relatively ice-free Antartica. The more daring of us might postulate sea commerce between South America, southern ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 117: May-June 1998 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Rare North Atlantic Light Wheel April 30, 1981. North Atlantic Ocean. "At exactly 2155 GMT, a white seasmoke type mist was observed glowing white between 2 and 5 metres above the sea surface. Further observation revealed that we were entering a large area of circulating bioluminescence of defined spiral form which appeared to be a pale emerald green in colour. Although the direction of rotation and the centre hub of the wheel could not be determined, the bands appeared to be of great dimension. While still proceeding through the bioluminescence and observing astern, it was noted that the formation of the bands became disrupted and seemed to diffuse a ragged appearance at the perimeter of the wheel to the port side of the vessel. Judging by the distance of the vessels close by -- which were being tracked by radar -- the extent of the rotating bands to the west could not be determined but they were estimated to be between and n. mile. The duration of the phenomenon was 4 minutes from entering to leaving the bioluminescence." (Lehepuu, K.; "Bioluminescence," Marine Observer, 52:76, 1982.) Comment. Bright marine bioluminescence is not uncommon in the Atlantic, particularly in warm waters, but it is very unusual to find geometrically organized displays. The light wheels seen in the Persian Gulf and South China Sea are more frequent and more highly structured. No one has ever come up with a ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 91: Jan-Feb 1994 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects The earth's biosphere, 'tis no thin veneer A recurring theme in SF is the three-dimensionality of terrestrial life. Customarily, life is considered confined to a thin spherical shell of air, water, and earth. But the bits of drillers have demonstrated that life prevails as far down as we can pierce the planet's integument. Now, K.G . Stetter et al: ". .. report the discovery of high concentrations of hyperthermophiles [viz., bacteria] in the production fluids from four oil reservoirs about 3,000 metres below the bed of the North Sea and below the permafrost surface of the North Slope of Alaska. Enrichment cultures of sulphidogens grew at 85 C and 102 C, which are similar to in reservoir temperatures." Stetter et al favor the theory that these hyperthermophiles were injected into the reservoirs through: (1 ) drilling and secondary-recovery operations; and/ or (2 ) natural penetration via faults and seeps. They pointedly distance themselves from the idea, championed by T. Gold, that subterranean bacteria are actually permanent ancient residents of a deep subterranean biosphere. (Stetter, K.O ., et al; "Hyperthermophilic Archaea Are Thriving in Deep North Sea and Alaskan Oil Reservoirs," Nature, 365:743, 1993.) On the other hand, in their comments on the above paper, J. Parkes and J. Maxwell do ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 96: Nov-Dec 1994 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Why do flying fish have such colorful wings?As he sailed tropical seas, A.D .G . Bell, in command of the ship Gandara , mused over this question: "Apart from the ones which quite graphically show the lift-off from the water, the other thing that interested me was the wing colouring of brown and yellow, and turquoise. I have noticed during passages around the world how the colours do apparently change, varying from almost trans-lucent purple to a deep navy colour, and wonder how many other colourings of flying-fish wings have been reported. "I think that flying fish are just taken for granted but perhaps if we looked at them more closely, then we may see some really weird and wondeful colours, especially in island areas. What does baffle me, is why, when the wings are only extended during flight, they should be of differing colours. I could understand it if they were a coral-swimming fish where the colours are designed to help them blend into the coral colours and so evade capture, but why the need in flight over crystal clear waters like the Coral Sea?" (Bell, A.D .G .; ". .. and Whether Fish Have Wings," Marine Observer, 64:136, 1994. This journal may be ordered from: The Stationery Office Publications Centre, P.O . Box 276, London ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 118: Jul-Aug 1998 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Phosphorescent Rings And Wheels October 13, 1996. Arabian Gulf. Aboard the tanker Arabiyah . Expanding phosphorescent rings were observed emanating from a single point. These rings were equally spaced and expanded outwards for about 500 meters before disappearing. Rings with spoke systems also formed, rotating clockwise. The observers had the distinct impression that the rings were above the sea surface. We have reported on so many of these light wheels in the past 22 years that we have skimped on the details in favor of the comments made by P. Herring of the Southampton Oceanography Centre. "This is a fascinating account of the most spectacular (and rare) bioluminescent phenomenon known (I have a record of some 250 reports in the last 100 years). These wheels/rings occur in relatively shallow water and are most frequently encountered in the Arabian Gulf and Bay of Bengal. The is no agreed cause, though some scientists have suggested seismic disturbances on the sea floor may be responsible." (Kent, D.R .; "Phosphorescent Wheels," Marine Observer, 67:192, 1997.) Comment. The frequent impression that these marine phosphorescent phenomena occur above the water surface is always puzzling because the bioluminescent organisms supposedly responsible are below the surface. From Science Frontiers #118, JUL-AUG 1998 . 1998-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 118: Jul-Aug 1998 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Astounding Undersea Structure Near Okinawa "A structure thought to be the world's oldest building, nearly twice the age of the great pyramids of Egypt, has been discovered. The rectangular stone ziggurat under the sea off the coast of Japan could be the first evidence of a previously unknown Stone Age civilization, say archeologists." Wow! Is this true? This so-called "structure" is 600 feet long and 90 feet high. Said to be about 10,000 years old, it obviously predates the edifices of the ancient Egyptians and Babylonians. The "structure" is now under about 75 feet of ocean near a small island named Yonaguni southwest of Okinawa. During the Ice Ages, it would have been exposed, just like the Bering Land Bridge to the north. Of course, the crucial question is: Is it really artificial? R. Schoch, the Boston University geologist who vouches that the Sphinx is also about 10,000 years old (SF#79), described the "structure" as a series of huge steps about 1 meter high. Schoch is impressed by the regularity of the steps, but does not discount a natural origin. A photo taken by divers does reveal a remarkably regular, stepped surface, but nature can be very methodical on occasion. Adding to the artificiality of the "structure" is the claim that a "road" encloses it. (Barot, Trushar; ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 14: Winter 1981 Supplement Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects More Phosphorescent Boomerangs July 10, 1979. The Arabian Sea. Aboard the m.v . Strathelgin. "At 1200 GMT large patches of milkygrey bioluminescence were observed; the patches appeared to form circular patterns resembling cartwheels, some of the configurations, however, did not have the central hub, see sketch. The patches pulsated at regular intervals (3 or 4 times per second). They moved in an anticlockwise direction until about 3 points abaft the beam where the direction of movement was reversed. On the beam they appeared to be at eye level, at all other times they were just above the surface of the water. The average size of the 'wheels' was 35 metres." (Penman, B.; "Bioluminescence," Marine Observer, 50:114, 1980.) Comment. A similar case of spinning boomerangs was reported in Lightning, Auroras, Nocturnal Lights, where the display was stimulated by switching the ship's radar on and off. Here, one must also ask how a bioluminescent phenomenon can exist at "eye level" many feet above the sea surface. To order the above-mentioned book, go to: here . From Science Frontiers #14, Winter 1981 . 1981-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Project Sourcebook Subjects A Continent Lost In The Pacific Ocean Our title is also the English title of a book published recently in Japan. The subtitle quoted below implies that we are not discussing the supposed lost continent of Mu. "Riddle of the Submarine Ruins in the Ryukyu Islands" Rather, the underwater site is that introduced in SF#118 and located southwest of Okinawa. It is hardly the size of a continent. The book's author is Masaaki Kimura, and he has filled his book with stunning underwater photographs and diagrams of this "lost continent." Unfortunately, except for a Contents page, which is in English, the rest of the book is in Japanese. We'll have to settle for the Contents page, which is rather revealing. Human Beings under the Sea The Submarine Ruins Discovered Were the Ryukyu Islands a Continent? Discovery of a Civilization Lost in the Sea An Ancient Civilization in Southernmost Japan A Continent Lost in the Pacific Ocean Submersion of the Land and Tectonics of the Earth Hypotheses for the Land Lost in the Pacific Ocean A Utopia Sunk in the Pacific Ocean Pretty inflammatory stuff, so much so that we must be wary indeed! One of the drawings in our photocopy is good enough to reproduce here. The immediate impression, as with many of the underwater photographs, is that surely this structure is artificial. But we must remember that Nature has her playful moods and has deposited simulacra everywhere, perhaps even on Mars, certainly with the Grand Tetons! (Kimura, Masaaki; A Continent Lost in the Pacific , all other bibliographical data in ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 107: Sep-Oct 1996 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Horizon-to-Horizon Bioluminescent Bubbling Band June 5, 1995. East China Sea. Aboard the m.v . Tokyo Bay enroute Busan to Kaohsiung. "At 1830 UTC whilst the ship was on a course of 218 at 21.5 knots, what seemed to be hundreds of fishing lights were seen right ahead of the ship and stretching from horizon to horizon. As the ship approached them, it became apparent that the lights were bioluminescence. "The appearance was like large single 'blobs' approximately the size of tennis balls, while at the main concentration the water seemed to be 'bubbling up' in a line stretching to both horizons. When the ship passed through the line, the luminescence gave off such a glare, as bright as daylight, that it was possible to read the identification numbers of the containers on the focsle. The duration of the phenomenon was about 5 minutes or 1.5 n.mile." (Hughan, D.S .; "Bioluminescence," Marine Observer, 66:62, 1996) Comment. P.J . Herring, Southampton Oceanography Centre, called this display "a most unusual account which I am unable to interpret." He opined that the blobs were probably cylindrical colonies of luminous sea squirts, but he could not account for the 1.5 -milewide, horizon-to-horizon bright glare and associated bubbling. Reference. For more ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 30: Nov-Dec 1983 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects THE AORTIC ARCH AND EVOLUTION Comparative anatomy is supposed to tell us which creatures are closely related so that we can draw those familiar evolutionary family trees. That anatomical similarities may be misleading is proved by the various configurations of the mammalian aortic arch -- certainly one of the major body structures. Five prin-cipal configurations of mammalian aortic arches are sketched in the accompanying figure. The species possessing these various configurations make kindling of the usual evolutionary family trees. Horses, pigs, deer; Whales, shrews; Marsupials, rats, dogs, apes, monkeys; The platypus, sea cows, some bats, humans; African elephants, walruses. (Davidheiser, Bolton; "The Aortic Arch," Creation Research Society Quarterly, 20:15, 1983.) Comment. On this basis alone, humans are more closely related to sea-cows than the apes. Why aren't such discrepancies highlighted in the mainstream scientific literature? Mammalian aortic arch . The key is as follows: RC: right carotid; LC: left carotid; RS: right subclavian; LS: left subclavian; A: aorta. The kinds of animal which have various arrangements are mentioned in the text. From Science Frontiers #30, NOV-DEC 1983 . 1983-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... No. 37: Jan-Feb 1985 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Recent Pulsations Of Life At a recent meeting of scientists at the Lamont-Doherty Geological Observatory, E. Vrba, of the Transvaal Museum, in Pretoria, stated: "If we eventually are able to establish a good time resolution with the continental record, I expect to be able to discern synchronous pulses of evolution that involve many groups of fauna and flora. Many different lineages in the biota will respond by synchronous waves of speciation and extinction to global temperature extremes and attendant environmental changes. This is my starting hypothesis." Vrba was speaking mainly about the last 25 million years, a mere flash in geological time. For this brief period, the Deep Sea Drilling Program has provided geologists with a detailed and continuous record of climate changes as they were recorded in deep-sea sediments. By contrast, the faunal history of the continents is rather fragmentary, making it rather difficult to match up pulsations of climate with pulsations of life. Even so, scientists have found rather strong correlations between climatary change and biological speciation and extinction at 15, 5, and 2.4 million years ago. (Lewin, Roger; "The Paleoclimatic Magic Numbers Game," Science, 226:154, 1984.) Comment. Note that this is just the period our ancestors seemed to be evolving rapidly. Also interesting is the general agreement between Vrba's statement about the driving forces behind evolution and McClintock's conclusion quoted earlier under BIOLOGY. From ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 32: Mar-Apr 1984 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects An Ocean Full Of Viruses "A decade ago, veterinarian Alvin Smith, now at Oregon State University, found that a virus causing lesions and spontaneous abortions in California sea lions was 'indistinguishable' from one that ravaged pigs nationwide in 1952. New varieties of the culprit -- called a calicivirus -- have since turned up in diverse hosts: whales, cats, snakes and even primates. To reach such a variety of hosts, they either jump from organism to organism, Smith proposes, or they escape from bubbles popping on the ocean surface, waft ashore and enter a food chain. If he is right, the seas may be a bottomless reservoir for viruses -- and our attempts to combat diseases on land may be nullified by legions of new strains waiting to come ashore. In fact, some flu viruses are said to be spread by wild ducks." (Anonymous; "Are the World's Oceans a Viral Breeding Ground," Science Digest, 92:20, February 1984.) Comment. We leave it to the reader to fit this piece of the jigsaw to the preceding and following pieces. From Science Frontiers #32, MAR-APR 1984 . 1984-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 106: Jul-Aug 1996 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Multiple Phosphorescent Wheels This is the sketch mentioned in the Marine Observer article. April 17, 1995. Strait of Hormuz in the Persian Gulf. Aboard the m.v . British Reliance, enroute Fujairah to Kharg Island. Observers: the Master and Second Officer. "At 1525 UTC whilst in the westbound lane of the Traffic Separation Scheme and shortly after settling on a course of 270 , a small amount of blue phosphorescence was noticed in the sea waves ahead (the swell being very low). Suddenly, the wind appeared to blow quite strongly, swirling around the vessel and then for as far as the eye could see and all around the vessel, phosphorescent cartwheels of bright-blue light began forming. The bands of light were roughly 30 cm thick while the maximum diameter of the wheels was 15-18 m. "Their direction of movement seemed random and they were spinning at high speed, some chasing each other, others spinning in opposite directions next to each other, see sketch. "Whole groups dumbbelled around each other, all spinning in apparently random directions. The display lasted for about 18 minutes before petering out." A comment by P.J . Herring of the Southampton Oceanography Centre followed. "A quite extraordinary account of phosphorescent wheels occurring in one of the places where they are most often seen. In the 200, or so, cases of this phenomenon reported in the last 100 years, ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 44: Mar-Apr 1986 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Unidentified Flashing Object May 6, 1984. Equatorial Eastern Atlantic. "Whilst the vessel was approaching the equator, on a course of 023 and at a speed of 10.3 knots, flashing white lights were observed. The sea was rippled, with a low NW'ly swell and the wind light airs. The visibility was good, with the moon in its first quarter. At first it was thought that there were three lights, one being bright and the other two relatively dim, but as the vessel approached it it was decided that there were only two, one bright and one dim. "The radar, a 10-cm S-band Decca, was switched on and a single echo was detected initially at a range of 5 n. mile. By this time the lights had already been observed for halfan-hour, so it was estimated that they had first been observed when they were 10 n. mile distant. The time of the first sighting was 2220 GMT. The target, once detected, gave a very strong echo and gave the impression of being a large target. It was plotted and found to be stationary. The initial course of 023 was altered to 028 in order to enable the vessel to close the passing distance. "Throughout the observations neither light followed any set characteristic. Instead they just flashed at random, but never together. The intensity of the bright light would have ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 76: Jul-Aug 1991 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Eight Leatherback Mysteries Our subject here is the leatherback turtle. Weighing up to 1600 pounds, it is the largest of the sea turtles. It is also the fastest turtle, hitting 9 miles per hour at times. But weight and speed are not necessarily mysterious; here are some characteristics that are: The leatherback is the only turtle without a rigid shell. Why? Perhaps it needs a flexible shell for its very deep dives. What looks like a shell is its thick, leathery carapace -- a strange streamlined structure with five to seven odd "keels" running lengthwise. These turtles are warm-blooded , and able to maintain their temperatures as much as 10 F above the ambient water, just as the dinosaurs apparently could. The bones of the leatherback are more like those of the marine mammals (dolphins and whales) than the reptiles. "No one seems to understand the evolutionary implications of this." Leatherbacks dive as deep as 3000 feet which is strange because they seem to subside almost exclusively on jellyfish, most of which are surface feeders. Like all turtles, leatherbacks can stay submerged for up to 48 hours. Just how they do this is unexplained. Their brains are miniscule. A 60-pound turtle possessed a brain weighing only 4 grams -- a rat's weighs 8! Leatherbacks' intestines contain waxy balls, recalling the ambergris found in the intestines of sperm whales. The stomachs of ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 101: Sep-Oct 1995 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects The algorithmic beauty of seashells Most will admit that many seashells are pretty, but how did all those colors and geometrical markings arise? Perhaps a more profound question is: Why do sea-shells need to be pretty in the first place? After all, most (but not all) of the shell owners do not have eyes with which to appreciate their handiwork! However, mathematicians and computer modellers do have eyes. They have also had a lot of fun and some success in devising algorithms (mathematical methods) for the generation of seashell markings. In fact, our title above is also the title of a new book by H. Meinhardt, which suggests how a suite of simple biochemical processes can create those shells coveted by collectors. Meinhardt has devised equations that describe chemical factors that turn pigment-generating cells on and off. In its simplest form, a mathematically modelled seashell is a two-dimensional sheet that grows along only one edge. Cells on this edge may or may not secrete pigment depending upon chemical "influences." B. Hayes describes how this sort of model operates: The triangular pattern on Cymbiola innexa suggests the presence of a "global control element" that turns the pigment-secreting cells on and off in the correct order -- something like a computer-controlled loom! "Given this generating mechanism, some shell patterns are easy to understand. A series of vertical stripes -- that ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 21: May-Jun 1982 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects What's ok in the mediterranean is verboten in the atlantic and the pacific Geologists and geophysicists have now satisfied themselves that a few million years ago the Mediterranean dried up nearly completely. The Deep Sea Drilling Project discovered in 1970 and 1975 that layers of evaporites existed beneath the Mediterranean's floor. In addition, over 80 years ago, the bed of the Rhone River was found to consist of river sands and gravels superimposed upon hundreds of feet of oceanic sediments. Beneath these deposits -- some 3000 feet down -- was a gorge cut in granitic rock. Other rivers emptying into the Mediterranean had cut similar gorges into solid rock long ago. No one could provide an acceptable explanation for the deep-cut gorges until the evaporites proved that the water level had been low enough for the rivers to cut the gorges subaerially. In other words, the Mediterranean's level fell several thousand feet, allowing the rivers to erode gorges much as the Colorado does today in the Grand Canyon. (Smith, E.G . Walton; "When the Mediterranean Went Dry," Sea Frontiers, 28:66, 1982.) Comment. The Med's buried gorges are obviously close cousins of the many submarine canyons found around the world's continental shelves. Most geologists strongly resist any explanation of the submarine canyons involving subaerial erosion, because no one believes the oceans ever dropped thousands of feet. True, the ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 16: Summer 1981 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Paradox Of The Drowned Carbonate Platforms The biological processes that build carbonate reefs and platforms are so efficient that platform growth potential is easily several times the rate of average geological subsidence or sea-level rise. Therein lies the paradox: the geological record is full of drowned carbonate platforms, inferring that the sea has frequently engulfed them in episodes that must be termed catastrophic. Since the usual long-term geologic processes are clearly inadequate, Schlager proposes several more violent schemes; including massive submarine volcanism (Middle Cretaceous) and extraterrestrial deterioration of the oceanic biological environment (Lake Devonian). (Schlager, Wolfgang; "The Paradox of Drowned Reefs and Carbonate Platforms," Geological Society of America, Bulletin, 92:197, 1981.) Reference. See Category ETE2 in our Catalog: Carolina Bays, Mima Mounds, for more on drowned sections of crust. More on this book can be found here . From Science Frontiers #16, Summer 1981 . 1981-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 79: Jan-Feb 1992 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Those slippery (adult) eels Every year untold millions of adult eels swim down the rivers of the continents toward the sea, where they are literally swallowed up. They are never seen again! In the Atlantic, the oft-told sci-entific tale is that all the adult eels from Europe and eastern North America converge on the Sargasso Sea. Here, they mate and die. It is in this area of the Atlantic that one finds high concentrations of eel larva, called leptocephali; and this alone is why the eels are thought to spawn here. In a long article in Science News, E. Pennisi is the latest to wonder where the adult eels are. She relates how, despite several ambitious expeditions well-armed with nets, traps, and sundry eel-catching devices, ". .. no one has ever spotted adult eels in the spawning grounds." Actually, Pennisi's article focusses on the Pacific and a 1991 Japanese expedition that searched for the spawning grounds of Anguilla Japonica , the Japanese eel. Earlier searches had been in conclusive. The 1991 attempt, after arduous labors and 16,000 kilometers of cruising, found the highest concentrations of leptocephali east of the Philippines. But, as in the Atlantic, even though many larvae were captured, no adult eels turned up in the nets. (Pennisi, Elizabeth; "Gone Eeling," Science News, 140:297, ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 29: Sep-Oct 1993 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Life beyond 100 c Bacteria can survive and multiply in hot springs near and slightly above 100 C -- the boiling point of water at atmospheric pressure. Few scientists have contemplated the possibility of life forms prospering at temperatures well beyond 100 . Recently, however, the discovery of many new and frequently bizarre organisms clustered around deep-sea vents has forced a reexamination of high-temperature life. It seems that bacteria actually flourish in the 350 C water streams from the deep-sea vents. In the lab, these same bacteria multiply rapidly in water at 250 C kept liquid by pressures of 265 atmospheres of pressure. What a surprise! Quoting a concluding sentence from this article: "This greatly increases the number of environments and conditions both on Earth and elsewhere in the Universe where life can exist." (Baross, John A., and Deming, Jody W.; "Growth of 'Black Smoker' Bacteria at Temperatures of at Least 250 C," Nature, 303:423, 1983.) Comment. Ignoring for the moment the extraterrestrial possibilities, the earth is riddled like a Swiss cheese with hot, fluid environments, which we may now consider potential abodes of life. Subterranean life represents a new biological frontier. Who knows what kinds of organisms have developed to feed upon the planet's heat? Could they have con-tributed to our supplies of petroleum and natural gas? From Science Frontiers # ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 61: Jan-Feb 1989 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Chaos Below "In a dive on the submersible Alvin just west of the Mariana trench, scientists discovered a cache of unusual features, including chimneys spewing out mineral-laden cold water on top of submerged mountains that rise 2,500 meters from the seafloor. While volcanic eruptions form most sea-mounts, these mountains consist of a nonvolcanic rock called serpentinite, and oceanographers are not entirely sure how the serpentinite mountains formed." The theory of plate tectonics has the Pacific plate diving under the Philippine plate along the Mariana trench. It may be that water trapped in the downgoing crust leaks out, rises, and serpentinizes the crust above. This altered rock, being lighter than that surrounding it, may slowly rise through it, eventually forming undersea mountains. (Monastersky, Richard; "Novel Mountains and Chimneys in the Sea," Science News, 134:333, 1988.) Comment. This all sounds pretty speculative, but those mountains had to come from somewhere. Perhaps the serpentinite mountains are just one manifestation of a larger phenomenon: the chaotic slithering and popping up and down of crustal material. The following is from New Scientist: "Geophysicists in California and Illinois say that they have found the Earth's "missing" crust by analyzing shock waves from earthquakes to determine the chemical composition of the Earth's interior. If the researchers are correct, then the view of the interior of the Earth that scientists ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 118: Jul-Aug 1998 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Two Creations Of Life?The lifeforms called Archaea and Eubacteria follow radically different life styles. The former are very happy in such extreme environments as the salty Dead Sea and the sea-bottom, hydrothermal vents; the latter prosper in bad hamburgers and your gut. Despite their differences, they have always been thought to have evolved from a common ancestor. A more subtle, fundamental difference has now been found. Recall SF#117 and how some terrestrial life forms do incorporate right-handed molecules in their structures, especially in cell membranes? The ubiquitous Eubacteria do this. In the Archaea, however, the same structural components of the cell membranes (glycerophosphates) are left-handed. A subtle difference, but one with deep implications. Some scientists maintain that it is impossible for two organisms relying upon mirror-image versions of the same molecule to have evolved from a common ancestor. Their genomes must be fundamentally different. Conclusion: the Archaea and Eubacteria must have evolved separately, and from different biological wellsprings -- that is, "creations." Such thinking is anathema. M. Kates, a Canadian evolutionary biologist, is skeptical. "Both the physics and chemistry of membranes are so complex that I would regard it as highly improbable that they could have auto-assembled twice." (Barnett, Adrian; "The Second Coming," New Scientist, p. 19, February 14, 1998.) ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 50: Mar-Apr 1987 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Chain of crevicular habitats?Towards the end of an article on the eerie blue holes of the Bahamas appears this intriguing paragraph: "William Hart, of the Smithsonian Institution, and Tom Iliffe, of the Bermuda Biological Station, believe that blue holes are one link in a chain of crevicular habitats -- caves, fissures, rocks of the sea floor -- that stretches from one side of the ocean to the other, from the Americas, across the sea floor and the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, to Africa and the Mediterranean. Related Amphipods are not only found in Bahamian caves but in marine caves in Bermuda, the Pacific, and the Yucatan Peninsula." (Palmer, Robert; "In the Lair of the Lusca," Natural History, 96:42, January 1987.) Comment. With this, the vision arises of an earth-girdling, biologically and geologically connected stratum of life that we know next to nothing about. How porous is the earth's crust, and how far down in these pores and interstices does life survive? From Science Frontiers #50, MAR-APR 1987 . 1987-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 94: Jul-Aug 1994 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Earth's oldest paved road Forty-three miles southwest of Cairo lies a basalt quarry favored by ancient Egyptian artisans. Old Kingdom craftsmen laboriously cut this hard, black, glassy rock into royal sarcophagi and pavements for the mortuary temples at Giza just outside Cairo. To transport the heavy blocks of basalt from the quarry to Giza, the Egyptians built a quay on Lake Moeris, which then had an elevation of 66 feet above sea level and was located 7 ½ miles southeast of the quarry. (The Lake is now much smaller and 148 feet below sea level, indicating a large climate change.) Then, when the Nile flooded and its waters reached a gap in the hills separating the Lake and the Nile, the Egyptians were able to float the blocks of basalt over to the Nile and down to Cairo. Good thinking! But how did they transport the heavy blocks 7 ½ miles from quarry to quay? The answer: What was apparently the first paved road on the planet. This 4,600-year-old engineering feat averaged 6 ½ feet wide and was paved with thousands of slabs of sandstone and limestone, with some logs of petrified wood thrown in. Since the slabs show no grooves, it is thought that the stone-laden sleds moved on rollers. (Wilford, John Noble; "The World's Oldest Paved Road Is Found near Egyptian Quarry," New York Times, May ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 55: Jan-Feb 1988 Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues Last Issue Next Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Contents Archaeology Archeological Stonewalling and Shadow Science Curious Sand-filled Cavities in the Great Pyramid Sardinia's Prehistoric Towers Demystifying Those Australian Craters Early Boomerang Astronomy An Astronomical Paradox Why Do Spiral Galaxies Stay That Way? Or Do They? Biology Migrating Birds Collide with Magnetic Bump The Scientific Basis of Astrology The Ubiquity of Sea Serpents A Glitch in the Evolution of Whales Geology Do We Really Understand the Dinosaurs? Cyclothems As Solar-system Pulse Recorders Geophysics Wheels of Light: Sea of Fire Powerful Concentric Waves The Zeitoun Luminous Phenomena Presumed Ball Lightning Things That Bo Buzz in the Night Psychology Psyching Out Piezoelectric Transducers Goethe's Optics Reevaluated ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 87: May-Jun 1993 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Whence the earth's pulse?Geological history records a restless planet subject to a succession of chemical and physical upheavals. Have these great paroxysms been random in time? M.R . Rampino and K. Caldeira do not think so: Number of geological events during geologic time "Published data sets of major geologic events of the past 250 Myr (extinction events, sea-level lows, continental flood-basalt eruptions, mountain-building events, abrupt changes in sea-floor spreading, ocean-anoxic and blackshale events and the largest evaporite deposits) have been synthesized (with estimated errors). These events show evidence for a statistically significant periodic component with an underlying periodicity, formally equal to 26.6 Myr, and a recent maximum, close to the present time. The cycle may not be strictly periodic, but a periodicity of 30 Myr is robust to probable errors in dating of the geologic events." The obvious question is: What could cause a 30-million-year periodicity? Internally, the earth's innards might be periodic, possibly in terms of plume eruption, mineral phase changes, core convection, etc. Externally, comets and asteroids are cyclic. Rampino and Caldeira point out that the solar system crosses the heavily populated plane of the Galaxy every 30 million years. (Rampino, Michael R., and Caldeira, Ken; "Major Episodes of Geologic Change: Correlations, Time ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 87: May-Jun 1993 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects The vent glow and "blind" shrimp In 1988, when the research submersible Alvin was exploring those remarkable hydrothermal vents or "black smokers." Its CCD (Charge-Coupled Device) camera detected a ghostly glow emanating from the vents. Since this mineral-laden water gushing from these cracks in the deep-sea floor exits at 350 -400 C, the simplest explanation of the vent glow is that is is simply thermal radiation from the hot fluid. Indeed, color filters on the camera recorded a spectrum close to that of a 350 C plume. But the deep-sea shrimp camped around the vents have raised second thoughts. The shrimp, only a few inches long, live in the perpetual darkness of the miles-deep vents. They do not need and do not have ordinary eyes. Rather, they sport a mysterious organ on their backs that is connected to their brains by a nerve-fiber bundle much like an optic nerve. This organ is packed with the same light-sensitive pigments found in the eyes of surface creatures. Despite its unusual location on the shrimp, it is an "eye" of sorts. But of what use is it in the Stygian abysses? To find, perhaps, vent glows that betray the presence of chemosynthetic food sources. If this is so, the shrimps' optical organ, which is most sensitive in the blue-green portion of the spectrum, is ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 11: Summer 1980 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects A GEOTHERMAL WOMB?A flurry of papers and at least one TV documentary have widely promulgated the news that many life forms thrive near the thermal vents 2,550 meters under the sea along the Galapagos Rift. Mollusks, worms, crabs, and other forms of life make up a successful biological community where light never penetrates. Terrestrial heat rather than the sun keeps this life going. The geothermal heat reduces sulfur compounds emitted from the vents and chemosynthesis proceeds up the biological ladder without need for sunlight. (Karl, D.M ., et al; "Deep-Sea Primary Production at the Galapagos Hydrothermal Vents," Science, 207:1345, 1980.) Comment. The implications are far-reaching. Does life exist at great depths in the earth and beneath the apparently lifeless surfaces of the other planets? Photosynthetically sustained life may represent only a small slice of the biological pie. Was sunlight necessary for life to originate and evolve -- assuming it did each? From Science Frontiers #11, Summer 1980 . 1980-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 45: May-Jun 1986 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects The Gulper Eel And Its Knotty Problem Occasionally brought up from great depths in nets, the gulper eel consists mainly of a huge mouth followed by a large bag of skin and, finally, a very long thin tail. The eel, often 6 feet long, can swallow prey as large or larger than itself. Such features are not particularly rare in deep-sea-creatures, but we do have to briefly describe this grotesque fish to get a delightful anomaly. It seems that in a few recovered specimens, the thin tail is tied in several overhand knots! Now moray eels can knot themselves, but the gulper eel is just a floating stomach with negligible musculature in its whiplike tail. So, just how did the knots get there? (de Sylva, Donald P.; "The Gulper Eel and Its Knotty Problem," Sea Frontiers, 32:104, March-April 1986.) Comment. We cannot resist mentioning the occasional discovery of groups of rats all tied together by their tails. Called "rat kings," these hapless snarls of rodents are usually dismissed as pranks or outright prevarication. How-ever, in recent years, respected naturalists have found "squirrel kings" in the wild. Gulper eels are not the only animals with knotty problems. From Science Frontiers #45, MAY-JUN 1986 . 1986-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... wrote R.W . Service, the poet of the Arctic realms, about the eerie voices of the auroras. The low-frequency sound of the aurora is barely detectable by human ears. It is "felt" more than heard, as Service expressed so eloquently. Some skeptics have maintained that these ethereal sounds do not really exist, but modern instruments confirm that pressure waves are definitely produced in the atmosphere as the auroras weave and dance in the sky. Most auroral sound is in the infrasound range, which begins at the lower limit of human hearing -- about 20 Hertz. Just enough sound energy seeps over the 20-Hz limit to be heard by sensitive human ears during periods of intense activity. Another natural infrasound, weak but continuous, is the "voice of the sea." These sound waves, called "microbaroms," have periods in the 5-7 second range (0 .20-0 .14 Hz), well below the range of human ears. Such low-frequency sounds travel great distances with little attenuation. It is thought, therefore, that the "voice of the sea" is an extended source -- perhaps the collective acoustical signature of all the storms from all the world's oceans. But this is surmise. Actually, the air is full of infra-sound emanating from still-unidentified sources, as indicated in the figure. Humans may not hear infrasound, but a form of "mountain music" seems to have a mysterious, depressing effect upon some of us. Some infrasounds that last for as ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 14: Winter 1981 Supplement Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Worms with inside-out stomachs The recently discovered tube worms, living near the hot water vents on the ocean bottom off the Galapagos, have no mouths or guts. Their bodies are covered with thousands of feathery tentacles, each packed with blood vessels. Apparently, the tube worms extract nutrients directly from the sea water and expel wastes the same way -- having in effect external stomachs. These worms, which may be many feet long, contain enzymes that permit them to extract carbon dioxide from the seawater and fix it much like plants do during photosynthesis. George Somero, at Scripps, estimates that the enzyme levels in the worms are similar to those in a spinach leaf. (Anonymous; "15-Foot Sea Worm Has Plant Qualities," San Diego Evening Tribune, May 22, 1980. UPI dispatch) Comment. This curious biological anomaly developed in an ecological niche where the primary energy source for sustaining life is geothermal rather than solar. How did this remarkable situation arise? Do the tube worms have relatives in the fossil record showing a step-by-step development of inside-out stomachs? From Science Frontiers #14, Winter 1981 . 1981-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 1: September 1977 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects New England Seamounts Once Near Surface Exploration of the New England Seamount chain by the research submarine Alvin confirmed that some of these peaks, now all a kilometer or more below the surface, were once at or above the surface of the ocean. This undersea mountain chain contains more than 30 major peaks and stretches 1,600 miles southeast from the New England coast. Deep-sea dredging has previously brought up Eocene limestone of shallow-water origin from the submerged mountain tops, but the Alvin explorations resulted in the first eye-witness accounts of dead coral (which grows only near the surface) and rock samples containing strands of dead algae that grows only within 100 meters of the surface. The New England Seamounts have therefore either subsided on the order of a kilometer since Eocene times or sealevel has altered drastically. The Alvin dives also discovered a series of very striking and perplexing buttes obviously the results of erosion (see drawing on cover). The buttes are apparently composed of volcanic rock and are only a few meters high. Some unexplained, extremely vesicular (holefilled) rocks seen on the sea floor during the dives seem to be identical to samples occasionally dredged up and formerly classified as cinders jettisoned from old steamships. The underwater surveys suggested that these "cinders" have a natural (still mysterious) origin. (Heirtzler, J.R ., et al; "A Visit to the New England Seamounts," American Scientist, ...
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... Australians?Ask this question in a college class in archeology and you'll surely receive an "F "! Everyone knows that the first inhabitants of the New World filtered across the Bering Land Bridge and eventually worked their way all the way down to the tip of South America. Perhaps so, perhaps no. Conceivably some venturesome Australian seafarers could have island-hopped across the South Pacific or taken a polar route (as the Vikings did in the north) when the world was warmer. Radical as this notion seems, three classes of evidence hint that Australians may have set foot on South American shores more than 10,000 years ago. Human fossils. As revealed in SF#118, an 11,500-year-old human skull found in Brazil possesses features of South Sea Islanders rather than Asians. Stone artifacts. Scrapers and other simple stone artifacts from Los Toldos Cave in Patagonia, dated as 12,000 years old, are suspiciously similar to late-Pleistocene tools in Australia. (Ref. 1) Cave paintings. At Los Toldos and especially another Patagonian site called Estancia La Maria, there is distinctive artwork virtually identical to some from Australia. Specifically, this artwork consists of "hand negatives" (silhouettes of the artists' hands) and spiral and circular drawings composed of little spots. (Ref. 1) Additionally, a remarkable and entirely distinct form of Australian art -- the famous Bradshaw paintings -- are strangely echoed in the artwork of the Paracus Culture of Peru. (Ref. 2) Two curiously adorned flowing figures from a ...
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... -Dec 1984 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Who mapped antarctica in pre-medieval times?Conventional history has the Antarctic continent being discovered less than 200 years ago. However, the appearance of Terra Australis Re on Orontius Finaeus' map of 1531 and the depiction of a nearly identical continent on Mercator's 1538 map reveal sufficient, accurate knowledge of Antarctic features for us to conclude that someone discovered and mapped Antarctica well before 1500. The question is: Who? An interesting feature of Fineaeus' map is the reduced ice cover compared with what we find today. The Ross Ice Shelf, for example, was almost nonexistent. Such changes in ice cover are consistent with the modern theory of Antarctic climate changes. Apparently, the seas surrounding Antarctica were a bit warmer before 1500, and some unidentified early mariners brought knowledge of this continent back to Europe. (Weihaupt, John G.; "Historic Cartographic Evidence for Holocene Changes in the Antarctic Ice Cover," Eos, 65: 493, 1984.) Comment. Obviously missing from Weihaupt's analysis is any consideration of the famous Piri Re'is map and reference to the work of Charles Hapgood; specifically his Maps of the Ancient Sea Kings. From Science Frontiers #36, NOV-DEC 1984 . 1984-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... 25: Jan-Feb 1983 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Gas Hydrates And The Bermuda Triangle Gas hydrates are stable, solid lattices of water molecules, in which the water molecules are hydrogen-bonded into hollow spheres or oblate spheroids in which gas molecules are enclosed. They are not true compounds, but rather clathrates or inclusion compounds. They often form in huge masses in ocean-bottom sediments and, if disturbed by slumping or some other stimulus, can release immense quantities of gas bubbles. These gases rise to the surface, subdivided en route, and reach the surface as a huge upwelling of frothy, low-density fluid. A ship cannot float in such low-density fluids. If a large plume rose above the sea's surface, aircraft passing through it would lose engine power. Quoting the final paragraph: "Intermittent natural gas blowouts from hydrate-associated gas accumulations, therefore, might explain some of the many mysterious disappearances of ships and planes -- particularly in areas where deep-sea sediments contain large amounts of gas in the form of hydrate. This may be the circumstance off the southeast coast of the United States, an area noted for numerous disappearances of ships and aircraft." (McIver, Richard D.; "Role of Naturally Occurring Gas Hydrates in Sediment Transport," American Association of Petroleum Geologists, Bulletin, 66:789, 1982.) From Science Frontiers #25, JAN-FEB 1983 . 1983-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 34: Jul-Aug 1984 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Behind magnetic flip-flops The earth's magnetic field frequently reverses its polarity. Such flips can of-ten be correlated with climate changes, global ice volumes, sea-floor spreading rates, and deposition of black shales, tektite falls, biological extinctions, etc. The frustrating thing is the lack of clear-cut cause and effect; that is, how these phenomena are linked physically to the geomagnetic field. Part of the problem is that we can only guess at how the geomagnetic field is generated. Let us assume that the earth's magnetic field is created by dynamo action in the planet's fluid core. P. Olson finds analytically that the core dynamo may reverse sign due to fluctuations in core turbulence caused by two competing energy sources: heat loss at the mantle-core boundary and progressive growth of the inner core. In concept, the heat lost at the core-mantle boundary might be linked to climate changes and sea-floor spreading. Taking a different tack, D. Gubbins has investigated the possibility that field reversals are triggered by ice ages and meteorite impacts (tektite falls). The physical mechanism here would be the increase in pressure upon the core, which affects the rate of freezing in the outer core, and thus the power available to the core dynamo. Gubbins found that these externally caused pressure changes were too small to explain the polarity changes. However, the parameters involved ...
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... giant high pressure system centered near Easter Island weakens slightly and causes a shift in the circulation of Pacific Ocean currents. Weather patterns from North America to Australia lurch ponderously in sympathy. El Ninos occur every 4-7 years, suggesting some periodic phenomenon is waving a geophysical baton. The real cause of El Ninos is still obscure. However, the recent discovery of over 1,000 previously unmapped submarine volcanos rising from the seafloor in the eastern Pacific may lead to El Nino's source. The synchronous eruption of, say, 100 of these volcanos might warm the ocean around Easter Island a tad -- just enough to warm the atmosphere above a bit -- resulting in a shift of the high pressure area. The area of intense volcanic activity covers 55,000 square miles of sea floor where the Pacific and Nazca plates are separating. In addition to the active volcanos, many plumes of 800 F water gush from the sea floor in this area. The volcano-El Nino link is, therefore, not so far-fetched. (Nash, Nathaniel C.; "Volcano Group in Pacific May Cause El Nino," Pittsburgh Post Gazette, February 14, 1993. Cr. E. Fegert) Comment. If submarine volcanos do cause the El Ninos, and the El Ninos are periodic, the submarine volcanism would have to be periodic, too. This implies an unrecognized rhythm in the earth's internal fires. From Science Frontiers #89, SEP-OCT 1993 . 1993-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Dolphins to the rescue -- again!September 1983. Tokerau Beach, North-land, New Zealand. A pod of 80 pilot whales ran aground and were stranded by the ebbing tide. Local townspeople followed a new technique developed for aiding stranded cetaceans. They waded out, talking soothingly to the whales, and keeping their skins wet. When the tide came back in and refloated the whales, the New Zealanders turned them around and tried to guide them to deeper waters. Sometimes refloated cetaceans just turn around and reground themselves again, but this time the pilot whales were fortunate. A school of dolphins fishing offshore somehow apprehended the situation and swam into the shallows around the pilot whales. The dolphins then guided them out to sea. 76 of the pilot whales were thus saved. In a similar incident 5 years earlier at Whangarei harbor, a helicopter followed the dolphins and whales several miles out to sea, confirming interspecies aid. Such stories are reminiscent of those where drowning humans are helped by dolphins. (Anonymous; "Dolphin Pilots," Oceans, 17:50, 1984.) Reference. More instances where dolphins have come to the aid of humans are presented in BHX3 in Biological Anomalies: Humans III. Ordering information is located here . From Science Frontiers #35, SEP-OCT 1984 . 1984-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 38: Mar-Apr 1985 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Expanding Phosphorescent Rings May 9, 1983. Gulf of Oman. Aboard the m.v . Mahsuri. "At 1650 GMT, a pale green glow was seen to emanate from the horizon ahead. This gave the appearance of strong moonlight upon the surface of the water. The moon, however, was not in evidence. At 1700 GMT, rapid flashes of light were observed sweeping across the sea directly ahead of the vessel, giving the initial impression of a sudden increase of wind speed causing excessive spray. By 1715 GMT, the vessel was totally surrounded by completely random movements of light as far as the eye could see. The onset of this phenomenon was so rapid, not to say eerie, that the Master was called to the bridge to witness the event. For the next 15 minutes the sea was at a height of activity, displaying several systems of the most unusual bioluminescence. The most significant of these were what appeared to be Phosphorescent Wheels, which, although they did not seem to rotate, originated from a central hub and spread out rings in rapid succession, forming concentric circles. This was pointed out by many of those who observed them as being similar to the instance of a stone being dropped into a quiet pond and causing waves to spread out. In this case each wave crest was a band of fantastic light. Each wheel would last for a couple of minutes, continually flashing out bands of ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 126: Nov-Dec 1999 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Towering Shafts Of Light Ice crystals in the atmosphere can dazzle us with bright haloes, sundogs, and similar optical phenomena -- as long as the sun or moon are shining. Sometimes, though, human light sources will create remarkable displays using the same ice crystals. The first of the two examples below is notable for its extreme height; the second provides the accepted explanation. August 24, 1998. South China Sea. Aboard the m.v . Oriental Bay , Hong Kong to Singapore. "Four shafts of narrow vertical light were observed reflected in the sky. Upon consulting the chart it was revealed that they were 'reflections' of the four flares of the Kakap Natuna oil terminal, which at this point was 75 n mile away. "As indicated in the sketch, the shafts of light were visible above a lower layer of stratocumulus cloud, and, when measured by sextant, their upper tips were calculated to be nearly 13 km high. The shafts appeared to be reflected in a thin layer of cirrostratus and, as the vessel approached to 60 n mile from the terminal, the glow from the flares was also visible on the horizon." (Peterson, J.L .; "Optical Phenomenon," Marine Observer, 69:110, 1999.) Tall light pillars rise over the South China Sea February 4, 1999. Toyama Bay, Japan. The caption quoted below is located beneath ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 24: Nov-Dec 1982 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Early Chinese Voyages To Australia Dr. Alan Thorne, at the Australian National University, after studying early human fossils from both Australia and China, concludes that there was a significant movement of people from the Chinese coast to North Australia at least 10,000 years ago. He hypothesizes that the Chinese built sea-going rafts of bamboo and explored Indonesia as well as the Australian coast. (Anonymous; "Chinese 'First to Australia'," Melbounre Sun, August 14, 1982. Cr. G.D . Thompson.) Comment. The China-to-Australia trip is simplified by island-hopping, but the existence of an early Chinese sea-faring capability has later significance for the Americas, too. From Science Frontiers #24, NOV-DEC 1982 . 1982-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... the Pagan in the mid-Pacific, One July morning J. Caldwell spotted a tropic waterspout. Having heard that spouts had hurricane force winds in-side, whirlpools at their bases that could suck a ship under, and a solid wall of water being sucked up into the clouds, Caldwell threw caution to the winds and headed directly for the spout. "Pagan was swallowed by a cold wet fog and whirring wind. The decks tilted. A volley of spray swept across the decks. The rigging howled. Suddenly it was dark as night. My hair whipped my eyes, I breathed wet air, and the hard cold wind wet me through. Pagan's gunwales were under and she pitched into the choppy seaway. There was no solid trunk of water being sucked from the sea; no hurricane winds to blow down sails and masts; and no whirlpool to gulp me out of sight. Instead, I sailed into a high dark column from 75 to 100 feet wide, inside of which was a damp circular wind of 30 knots, if it was that strong. As suddenly as I had entered the waterspout I rode out into bright free air. The high dark wall of singing wind ran away. For me another mystery of the sea was solved." (Caldwell, John; "On Sailing through a Waterspout," Journal of Meteorology, U.K ., 11:236, 1986.) Reference. Several unusual types of waterspouts are described in GWT in the catalog: Tornados, Dark Days. Ordering information at: here . From Science ...
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