Off the coast of
Antarctica, a group of researches in an RV,
Nathaniel B. Palmer, idled 30 kilometers with a cable stretching 1,400
meters down on the continental shelf, a remote-operated vehicle. Surveying the
ocean floor it came across a grey mudscape and discovered a precursor. Many
species were previously found on this 57-day research escapade along the Antarctic
Peninsula in 2010, many being invertebrates. The ROV’s camera picked up a red-shelled crab, spidery and with a ‘leg-span
as wide as a chessboard’. Marine ecologist from the University of Hawaii at
Manoa, Craig Smith, stated, “They're natural invaders,” “They're coming in with
the warmer water” (Smith). According to Smith and his team of researchers the
crabs have been kept out of this area for over 30 million years due to the cold
temperatures, however the rise in temperature has caused the unfamiliar drift
of crabs along the continental shelf. Smith also reports in an analysis
suggesting that ‘1.5 million crabs already inhabit Palmer Deep, the sea-floor
valley that the ROV was exploring that night’. Smith notes, “There are no
hard-shell-crushing predators in Antarctica, when these come in they're going
to wipe out a whole bunch of endemic species” (Smith).
* Information obtained at www.scientificamerican.com
* Pictures obtained at www.newswhip.com & www.scientificamerican.com
Figure 22.1
Figure 22.2
No comments:
Post a Comment