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. (2021). How king penguins advertise their sexual maturity (Vol. 177). Bachelor's thesis, , .
Keywords: animal communication mate choice optimal response index ornamentation penguin sexual maturation vocalization
Programme: 137,354
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. (2021). Radar altimeter waveform simulations in Antarctica with the Snow Microwave Radiative Transfer Model (SMRT) (Vol. 263).
Abstract: Radar altimeters are important tools to monitor the volume of the ice sheets. The penetration of radar waves in the snowpack is a major source of uncertainty to retrieve surface elevation. To correct this effect, a better understanding of the sensitivity of the radar waveforms to snow properties is needed. Here, we present an extension of the Snow Model Radiative Transfer (SMRT) to compute radar waveforms and conduct a series of simulations on the Antarctic ice sheet. SMRT is driven by snow and surface roughness properties measured over a large latitudinal range during two field campaigns on the Antarctic Plateau. These measurements show that the snowpack is rougher, denser, less stratified, warmer, and has smaller snow grains near the coast than on the central Plateau. These simulations are compared to satellite observations in the Ka, Ku, and S bands. SMRT reproduces the observed waveforms well. For all sites and all sensors, the main contribution comes from the surface echo. The echo from snow grains (volume scattering) represents up to 40% of the amplitude of the total waveform power in the Ka band, and less at the lower frequencies. The highest amplitude is observed on the central Plateau due to the combination of higher reflection from the surface, higher scattering by snow grains in the Ka and Ku bands, and higher inter-layer reflections in the S band. In the Ka band, the wave penetrates in the snowpack less deeply on the central Plateau than near the coast because of the strong scattering caused by the larger snow grains. The opposite is observed in the S band, the wave penetrates deeper on the central Plateau because of the lower absorption due to the lower snow temperatures. The elevation bias caused by wave penetration into the snowpack show a constant bias of 10 cm for all sites in the Ka band, and a bias of 11 cm, and 21 cm in the Ku band for sites close to the coast and the central Plateau, respectively. Now that SMRT is performing waveform simulations, further work will address how the snowpack properties affect the parameters retrieved by more advanced retracking algorithms such as ICE-2 for different snow cover surfaces.
Keywords: Antarctic ice sheet Field measurements Modeling Radar altimetry Remote sensing SMRT Waveform
Programme: 1110
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Najat Bhiry, Dominique Marguerie, Tommy Weetaluktuk, Myosotis Desroches Bourgon, David Aoustin, Pierre M. Desrosiers, Dominique Todisco. (2021). Dorset and Thule Inuit occupations of Qikirtajuaq (Smith Island), Nunavik, Canada: a palaeoecological approach (Vol. Boreas).
Abstract: Qikirtajuaq is a long island facing the Inuit village of Akulivik on the northeastern coast of Hudson Bay (Canada) that is rich in archaeological sites. Kangiakallak-1 (JeGn-2), one of the main sites on this island, is a large multicomponent site that includes Dorset and Thule Inuit winter houses. This study documents the dynamics of palaeoenvironmental conditions in the successive occupations of the Kangiakallak-1 settlement based on plant macrofossils, pollen and non-pollen palynomorph analyses and archaeological research. The data indicate that Dorset inhabitants constructed their dwelling at about 772 cal. a BP. The site was reused by the Thule Inuit a few decades later, starting at about 671 cal. a BP. Thus, Kangiakallak-1 is one of the few sites, at least in Nunavik (northern Quebec, Canada), that were rapidly reoccupied by the Thule Inuit after the departure of the Dorset inhabitants, which indicates a possible overlap between the two cultures in the Akulivik region. The palaeoecological data show that both Dorset and Thule inhabitants left clear footprints at the local scale in the form of several nitrophilous species that became established in and near the houses and persisted over a long period. The deposition of domestic waste (including bone fragments, skin, burnt fat and charcoal fragments) inside the subterranean dwellings fertilized the soil and led to the growth of unique nitrophilous plants. These changes transformed the houses into exceptional floristic refuges.
Programme: 1080
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Matteo Feltracco, Elena Barbaro, Clara J. M. Hoppe, Klara K. E. Wolf, Andrea Spolaor, Rose Layton, Christoph Keuschnig, Carlo Barbante, Andrea Gambaro, Catherine Larose. (2021). Airborne bacteria and particulate chemistry capture Phytoplankton bloom dynamics in an Arctic fjord (Vol. 256). Bachelor's thesis, , .
Keywords: Air-to-sea exchanges Amino acids Arctic Atmospheric microorganisms Marine phytoplankton bloom
Programme: 1192
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. (2021). 10 years of Polar Stratospheric Clouds lidar measurements at the French antarctic station Dumont d'Urville.
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. (2021). Per- and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances Are Positively Associated with Thyroid Hormones in an Arctic Seabird (Vol. 40).
Keywords: Avian toxicity Ecotoxicology Endocrine-disrupting compounds Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substance Thyroid hormones
Programme: 330
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Viblanc Va, Stier A, Bize P, Schull Q, Criscuolo F, Groscolas R, Robin Jp. (2021). The ecophysiology of king penguins : responses to a fluctuating environment. Bachelor's thesis, , .
Abstract: Penguins are sea...birds. These highly evolved marine predators thrive in the oceanic habitat. Yet, they are conflicted – confronted to the duality of a life spent partly at sea, partly on-land. This life style has them subject to a number of very different ecological pressures. The ECONERGY polar project (IPEV #119) seeks to understand how king penguin cope with the constraints they face while living on-land, and the underlying physiological adaptations that allow them to do so. This includes studies dealing with fasting, parasites, predators, aggressive neighbors, climate and human disturbance. I will present some of the advances our project has made over the past decades, and where we will proceed in the years to come with a new project. We aim to understand bird stress from an integrative perspective, building a long-term observatory of penguin physiological responses to a changing world, and determining how breeding performances on land and foraging performances at sea are related.
Programme: 119
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Mark A. Hindell, Clive R. McMahon, Ian Jonsen, Robert Harcourt, Fernando Arce, Christophe Guinet. (2021). Inter- and intrasex habitat partitioning in the highly dimorphic southern elephant seal (Vol. 11). Bachelor's thesis, , .
Abstract: Partitioning resources is a key mechanism for avoiding intraspecific competition and maximizing individual energy gain. However, in sexually dimorphic species it is difficult to discern if partitioning is due to competition or the different resource needs of morphologically distinct individuals. In the highly dimorphic southern elephant seal, there are intersexual differences in habitat use; at Iles Kerguelen, males predominantly use shelf waters, while females use deeper oceanic waters. There are equally marked intrasexual differences, with some males using the nearby Kerguelen Plateau, and others using the much more distant Antarctic continental shelf ( 2,000 km away). We used this combination of inter and intrasexual behavior to test two hypotheses regarding habitat partitioning in highly dimorphic species. (a) that intersexual differences in habitat use will not appear until the seals diverge in body size and (b) that some habitats have higher rates of energy return than others. In particular, that the Antarctic shelf would provide higher energy returns than the Kerguelen Shelf, to offset the greater cost of travel. We quantified the habitat use of 187 southern elephant seals (102 adult females and 85 subadult males). The seals in the two groups were the same size ( 2.4 m) removing the confounding effect of body size. We found that the intersexual differences in habitat use existed before the divergence in body size. Also, we found that the amount of energy gained was the same in all of the major habitats. This suggests that the use of shelf habitats by males is innate, and a trade-off between the need to access the large benthic prey available on shelf waters, against the higher risk of predation there. Intrasexual differences in habitat use are another trade-off; although there are fewer predators on the Antarctic shelf, it is subject to considerable interannual fluctuations in sea-ice extent. In contrast, the Kerguelen Plateau presents more consistent foraging opportunities, but contains higher levels of predation. Habitat partitioning in this highly dimorphic species is therefore the result of complex interplay of life history strategies, environmental conditions and predation pressure.
Keywords: Antarctic Shelf foraging and diving behavior Kerguelen Plateau mid-year haul out predation risk Southern Ocean
Programme: 109,1201
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. (2021). Bachelor's thesis, , .
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. (2021). Surface ocean microbiota determine cloud precursors (Vol. 11).
Abstract: One pathway by which the oceans influence climate is via the emission of sea spray that may subsequently influence cloud properties. Sea spray emissions are known to be dependent on atmospheric and oceanic physicochemical parameters, but the potential role of ocean biology on sea spray fluxes remains poorly characterized. Here we show a consistent significant relationship between seawater nanophytoplankton cell abundances and sea-spray derived Cloud Condensation Nuclei (CCN) number fluxes, generated using water from three different oceanic regions. This sensitivity of CCN number fluxes to ocean biology is currently unaccounted for in climate models yet our measurements indicate that it influences fluxes by more than one order of magnitude over the range of phytoplankton investigated.
Keywords: Atmospheric science Marine biology
Programme: 1187
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