Caribbean

Sessile organisms, such as corals where adults are immobile and their growth position is determined at settlement, are confronted by unique circumstances arising in that particular location.

In some habitats, anthropogenic effects are causing large changes in community structure, as well as the environmental conditions to which they are exposed.  On a densely populated reef space is a limited resource. One of the ways organisms can win that space is through the strategy of shape.

Current research has shown that waters off Florida and the Bahamas are important pupping and feeding grounds for several sharks, providing them with the critical habitat required for the conservation of these slow-to-mature ocean animals.

Researchers at the University of Miami (UM) Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science studied the core home range of 86 bull, great hammerhead and tiger sharks tagged in waters off south Florida and the northern Bahamas.

A team of researchers from the University of Michigan focused on leatherback sea turtles nesting on St. Kitts, an island in the West Indies southeast of Puerto Rico. The team wanted to know what factors influence where and when the leatherbacks lay their eggs.

It has been suggested that characteristics of the sand, the slope of the beach and proximity to vegetation contribute to the success or failure of nests, but which factors cause female leatherback sea turtles to dig a nest in a particular spot has never been investigated.

During the battle between the French and the Dutch, who controlled Tobago at the time, the French flagship Glorieux, with her superior guns, sank the Dutch vessel on 3 March 1677.

Kroum Batchvarov, assistant professor of maritime archaeology and leader of the research team, said: “To find the Huis de Kreuningen—almost by accident, as she was outside the boundaries where we expected to find her—undiscovered and untouched for over 300 years was an exciting moment.”