“
“Calcium carbonate shells produced by large benthic foraminifers (LBF) are major components in sediments on coral reef islands. Quantifying growth patterns of LBFs is important for accurate estimation of calcium carbonate production. To quantify the growth pattern of Baculogypsina sphaerulata in a tropical area, we developed a novel rearing method with high survival rate (>90%) by creating constant disturbance with the combination of a floating chamber and coral sand. Through the rearing experiments, coral sand

has a significant inhibitory effect on lethal epiphyte infestation on B. sphaerulata in a rearing chamber. This implies that the inhibitory effect by such disturbance on the epiphyte may be one of the reason that B. sphaerulata prefer the most exposed areas among LBFs. The novel rearing method allowed the quantification P005091 research buy of the relationship between TH-302 nmr size and growth rate. The growth rate of B. sphaerulata showed size dependence with a peak at 0.8-1.2 mm(2), and development time to adult size was estimated at 1.3 year with substantial variation induced by variability in growth parameters. The estimated development time is similar to that reported in subtropical areas (1.5 year). This quantified

growth pattern of the species will apply to the analysis of population dynamics and estimation of CaCO3 productions of the species

in a tropical area. (C) 2013 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.”
“Animal manure is applied to agricultural land in areas of high livestock production. In the present study, we evaluated ageing of atrazine in two topsoils with and without addition SN-38 ic50 of manure and in one subsoil. Ageing was assessed as the bioavailability of atrazine to the atrazine mineralizing bacteria Pseudomonas sp. strain ADP. Throughout an ageing period of 90 days bioavailability was investigated at days 1, 10, 32, 60 and 90, where similar to 10(8) cells g(-1) of the ADP strain was inoculated to the C-14-atrazine exposed soil and (CO2)-C-14 was collected over 7 days as a measure of mineralized atrazine. Even though the bioavailable residue decreased in all of the three soils as time proceeded, we found that ageing occurred faster in the topsoils rich in organic carbon than in subsoil. For one topsoil rich in organic carbon content, Simmelk’r, we observed a higher degree of ageing when treated with manure. Contrarily, sorption experiments showed less sorption to Simmelk’r treated with manure than the untreated soil indicating that sorption processes are not the only mechanisms of ageing. The other topsoil low in organic carbon content, Ringe, showed no significant difference in ageing between the manure-treated and untreated soil.