Beta diversity can be defined as the variability in species composition among sampling units for a given area. We propose that it can be measured as the average dissimilarity from individual observation units to their group centroid in multivariate space, using an appropriate dissimilarity measure. Differences in beta diversity among different areas or groups of samples can be tested using this approach. The choice of transformation and dissimilarity measure has important consequences for interpreting results. For kelp holdfast assemblages from New Zealand, variation in species composition was greater in smaller holdfasts, while variation in relative abundances was greater in larger holdasts. Variation in community structure of Norwegian continental shelf macrobenthic fauna increased with increases in environmental heterogeneity, regardless of the measure used. We propose a new dissimilarity measure which allows the relative weight placed on changes in composition vs. abundance to be specified explicitly.

[1] Global tropospheric ozone distributions, budgets, and radiative forcings from an ensemble of 26 state-of-the-art atmospheric chemistry models have been intercompared and synthesized as part of a wider study into both the air quality and climate roles of ozone. Results from three 2030 emissions scenarios, broadly representing ''optimistic,'' ''likely,'' and ''pessimistic'' options, are compared to a base year 2000 simulation. This base case realistically represents the current global distribution of tropospheric ozone. A further set of simulations considers the influence of climate change over the same time period by forcing the central emissions scenario with a surface warming of around 0.7K. The use of a large multimodel ensemble allows us to identify key areas of uncertainty and improves the robustness of the results. Ensemble mean changes in tropospheric ozone burden between 2000 and 2030 for the 3 scenarios range from a 5% decrease, through a 6% increase, to a 15% increase. The intermodel uncertainty (±1 standard deviation) associated with these values is about ±25%. Model outliers have no significant influence on the ensemble mean results. Combining ozone and methane changes, the three scenarios produce radiative forcings of À50, 180, and 300 mW m À2, compared to a CO 2 forcing over the same time period of 800-1100 mW m À2 . These values indicate the importance of air pollution emissions in short-to medium-term climate forcing and the potential for stringent/lax control measures to improve/worsen future climate forcing. The model sensitivity of ozone to imposed climate change varies between models but modulates zonal mean mixing ratios by ±5 ppbv via a variety of feedback mechanisms, in particular those involving water vapor and stratosphere-troposphere exchange. This level of climate change also reduces the methane lifetime by around 4%.

[1] We use 23 atmospheric chemistry transport models to calculate current and future (2030) deposition of reactive nitrogen (NO y , NH x ) and sulfate (SO x ) to land and ocean surfaces. The models are driven by three emission scenarios: (1) current air quality legislation (CLE); (2) an optimistic case of the maximum emissions reductions currently technologically feasible (MFR); and (3) the contrasting pessimistic IPCC SRES A2 scenario. An extensive evaluation of the present-day deposition using nearly all information on wet deposition available worldwide shows a good agreement with observations in Europe and North America, where 60-70% of the model-calculated wet deposition rates agree to within ±50% with quality-controlled measurements. Models systematically overestimate NH x deposition in South Asia, and underestimate NO y deposition in East Asia. We show that there are substantial differences among models for the removal mechanisms of NO y , NH x , and SO x , leading to ±1 s variance in total deposition fluxes of about 30% in the anthropogenic emissions regions, and up to a factor of 2 outside. In all cases the mean model constructed from the ensemble calculations is among the best when comparing to measurements. Currently, 36-51% of all NO y , NH x , and SO x is deposited over the ocean, and 50-80% of the fraction of deposition on land falls on natural (nonagricultural) vegetation. Currently, 11% of the world's natural vegetation receives nitrogen deposition in excess of the ''critical load'' threshold of 1000 mg(N) m À2 yr À1 . The regions most affected are the United States (20% of vegetation), western Europe (30%), eastern Europe (80%), South Asia (60%), East Asia

Summary 1.One of the general characteristics of ecological communities is that the number of species accumulates with increasing area sampled. However, it is important to distinguish between the species-area relationship and species accumulation curves. The species-area relationship is concerned with the number of species in areas of different size irrespective of the identity of the species within the areas, whereas the species accumulation curve is concerned with accumulation rates of new species over the sampled area and depends on species identity. 2. We derive an exact analytical expression for the expectance and variance of the speciesaccumulation curve in all random subsets of samples from a given area. The analytical species accumulation curve may be approximated by a semilog curve. Both the exact accumulation curve and its semilog approximation are independent of the underlying species abundance distributions, but are influenced strongly by the distribution of species among the samples and the spatial relationship of the samples that are randomized. 3. To estimate species richness in larger areas than that sampled we take account of the spatial relationship between samples by dividing the sampled area into subareas. First a species-accumulation curve is obtained for randomized samples of all the single subareas. Then the species-accumulation curve for all combinations of two subareas is calculated and the procedure is repeated for all subareas. From these curves a new total species (T-S) curve is obtained from the terminal point of the subarea plots. The T-S curve can then be extrapolated to estimate the probable total number of species in the area studied. 4. Data from the Norwegian continental shelf show that extrapolation of the traditional species-accumulation curve gave a large underestimate of total species richness for the whole shelf compared with that predicted by the T-S curve. Application of nonparametric methods also gave large underestimates compared with actual data obtained from more extensive sampling than the data analysed here. Although marine soft sediments sampled in Hong Kong were not as variable as those from the Norwegian shelf, nevertheless here the new method also gave higher estimates of total richness than the traditional species-accumulation approaches. 5. Our data show that both the species-accumulation curve and the accompanying T-S curve apply to large heterogeneous areas varying in depth and sediment properties as well as a relatively small homogeneous area with small variation in depth and sediment properties.

[1] We analyze present-day and future carbon monoxide (CO) simulations in 26 state-ofthe-art atmospheric chemistry models run to study future air quality and climate change. In comparison with near-global satellite observations from the MOPITT instrument and local surface measurements, the models show large underestimates of Northern Hemisphere (NH) extratropical CO, while typically performing reasonably well elsewhere. The results suggest that year-round emissions, probably from fossil fuel burning in east Asia and seasonal biomass burning emissions in south-central Africa, are greatly underestimated in current inventories such as IIASA and EDGAR3.2. Variability among models is large, likely resulting primarily from intermodel differences in representations and emissions of nonmethane volatile organic compounds (NMVOCs) and in hydrologic cycles, which affect OH and soluble hydrocarbon intermediates. Global mean projections of the 2030 CO response to emissions changes are quite robust. Global mean midtropospheric (500 hPa) CO increases by 12.6 ± 3.5 ppbv (16%) for the high-emissions (A2) scenario, by 1.7 ± 1.8 ppbv (2%) for the midrange (CLE) scenario, and decreases by 8.1 ± 2.3 ppbv (11%) for the low-emissions (MFR) scenario. Projected 2030 climate changes decrease global 500 hPa CO by 1.4 ± 1.4 ppbv. Local changes can be much larger. In response to climate change, substantial effects are seen in the tropics, but intermodel variability is quite large. The regional CO responses to emissions changes are robust across models, however. These range from decreases of 10-20 ppbv over much of the industrialized NH for the CLE scenario to CO increases worldwide and year-round under A2, with the 1 of 24 largest changes over central , southern Brazil (20-35 ppbv) and south and east Asia (30-70 ppbv). The trajectory of future emissions thus has the potential to profoundly affect air quality over most of the world's populated areas.Citation: Shindell, D. T., et al. (2006), Multimodel simulations of carbon monoxide: Comparison with observations and projected near-future changes,

Air quality, ecosystem exposure to nitrogen deposition, and climate change are intimately coupled problems: we assess changes in the global atmospheric environment between 2000 and 2030 using twenty-five state-of-the-art global atmospheric chemistry models and three different emissions scenarios. The first (CLE) scenario reflects implementation of current air quality legislation around the world, whilst the second (MFR) represents a more optimistic case in which all currently feasible technologies are applied to achieve maximum emission reductions. We contrast these scenarios with the more pessimistic IPCC SRES A2 scenario. Ensemble simulations for the year 2000 are consistent among models, and show a reasonable agreement with surface ozone, wet deposition and NO 2 satellite observations. Large parts of the world are currently exposed to high ozone concentrations, and high depositions of nitrogen to ecosystems. By 2030, global surface ozone is calculated to increase globally by 1.5±1.2 ppbv (CLE), and 4.3±2.2 ppbv (A2). Only the progressive MFR scenario will reduce ozone by -2.3±1.1 ppbv. The CLE and A2 scenarios project further increases in nitrogen critical loads, with particularly large impacts in Asia where nitrogen emissions and deposition are forecast to increase by a factor of 1.4 (CLE) to 2 (A2). Climate change may modify surface ozone by -0.8±0.6 ppbv, with larger decreases over sea than over land. This study shows the importance of enforcing current worldwide air quality legislation, and the major benefits of going further. Non-attainment of these air quality policy objectives, such as expressed by the SRES-A2 scenario, would further degrade the global atmospheric environment.

Summary 1.We examined data on soft-sediment macrobenthos (organisms retained on a 1-mm sieve) from a transect of c. 1960 km along the Norwegian continental shelf (56-71°N), covering a range of water depths (65-434 m) and varying sediment properties. 2. A total of 809 species was recorded from 101 sites. Of these, 36% were restricted to one or two sites, and 29% were represented by one or two individuals. No species spanned the entire transect. Polychaetes were the dominant taxonomic group, followed by crustaceans, molluscs and echinoderms. 3. Alpha diversity (sample species richness) was highly variable (35-148 species) but showed no evidence of a relationship to latitude or other environmental variables. 4. Beta diversity was measured as Whittaker's β W , the number of shared species, complementarity (biotic distinctness) and Bray-Curtis similarity, and there was no evidence of a latitudinal trend on the shelf. Beta diversity increased with the level of environmental variability, and was highest in the southern-central area, followed by the most northern area. Change in environmental variables had a stronger effect on beta diversity than spatial distance between sites. 5. Gamma diversity was computed by pooling samples over large areas. There was no convincing evidence of a latitudinal cline in gamma diversity, but gamma diversity increased with the level of environmental heterogeneity. Mean alpha diversity and gamma diversity were not significantly correlated. Whereas mean complementarity and mean Bray-Curtis similarity were related to gamma diversity, β W was not.

Soft-sediment macrobenthos data for the Norwegian continental shelf (61°N, 1 to 2°E) was used to examine species distributions, community structure and community differences, and how different measures of biodiversity are related to environmental variability. Water depth at 35 sites ranged from 115 to 331 m over a spatial sampling scale of ca. 45 km × 60 km, and there was considerable variation in sediment characteristics. Of a total of 508 recorded species, 39% were restricted to 1 or 2 sites, whereas only 3 species spanned the entire sampling area. Polychaetes were the most common and widespread taxonomic group; crustaceans and echinoderms were more restricted in their distributions than the other dominant groups. Whittaker's beta diversity measure ( β W , extent of change in species composition among sites) was highest for those groups with the highest proportion of restricted-range species. The number of shared species, the complementarity (biotic distinctness), and the Bray-Curtis similarity between all pairwise combinations of sites (3 beta diversity measures) were more strongly related to change in environment (notably depth, followed by median grain size and silt-clay content) than to spatial distance between sites. Likewise, a multivariate analysis (BIO-ENV) identified these factors as the major environmental variables influencing the faunal patterns, whereas univariate measures of diversity were not related to depth or median grain size. Univariate measures of diversity, beta diversity measures, and BIO-ENV analyses showed that molluscs, followed by polychaetes, were most highly related to environmental variables. In this study, alpha, beta and gamma diversity were higher than in a study of a single soft-sediment habitat type in the southern part of the Norwegian continental shelf.