Debris field

Its amazing and a bit sad how disasters spurs scientific innovation and opportunity. The introduction of 14C into the oceans by nuclear testing and attacks provided a marker to follow ocean overturning and circulation patterns. Large response teams, including scientists, were mobilized after the Deep Horizon blowout. The influx of funding has improved research efforts and our understanding of the Gulf Coast ecosystem from the shoreline to the deep sea.

NOAA has run OSCURS (Ocean Surface Current Simulator), a numeric model for ocean surface currents, to predict the movement of marine debris generated by the Japan tsunami over five years. The results are shown here. Year 1 = red; Year 2 = orange; Year 3 = yellow; Year 4 = light blue; Year 5 = violet.  The OCSURS model is used to measure the movement of surface currents over time, as well as the movement of what is in or on the water. Map courtesy of J. Churnside (NOAA OAR) and created through Google. http://marinedebris.noaa.gov/

The opportunities from the devastating Japan earthquake and tsunami have been less publicized in the US (since it was not a national affair and had less commercial and political drama). Still, scientific resources have been mobilized here as well. While the goals have largely been to track the debris field and assess the radiation risk to humans and marine life, the work is also providing information and tools to help understand dispersal (how selfish of me). Debris tracks (click to see animated projections) are in many ways equivalent to, and thus can inform, dispersal trajectories.

More locally in Japan, the radiation spike introduced rare isotopes that will be taken up into biological material, including the shells and/or tissues of larvae. The concentration of the isotopes combined with an age estimate (possible for fish) of larvae collected at settlement or just after settlement would facilitate generating population matricies - the isotope concentration provides information about the home location and collection site is the final settlement site. Using isotopes and other geochemical tags is already being applied to population connectivity studies. However, the limiting factor is often geographic variation in isotopes. The radiation leak, while horrible, introduced an anthropogenic gradient in rare isotopes with variable half lives. Its an interesting opportunity... I hope someone is doing it!