The Gulf of Mexico: An Overview

McKinney, Larry; Shepherd, J. G.; Wilson, Charles W.; Hogarth, William T.; Chanton, Jeff; Murawski, Steven A.; Sandifer, Paul A.; Sutton, Tracey; Yoskowitz, David; Wowk, Katya; Özgökmen, Tamay M.; Joye, Samantha; Caffey, Rex H.

doi:10.5670/oceanog.2021.115

Cited by 10 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 70 publications

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“…Numerous fish and wildlife species, including about 75% of waterfowl traversing the U.S., seabirds, wading birds, fur-bearers, and sport and commercial fisheries, are habituated in the Gulf's coastal wetlands [1]. The Gulf of Mexico encompasses over five million acres (about half of the U.S. total).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Structuring Nutrient Yields throughout Mississippi/Atchafalaya River Basin Using Machine Learning Approaches

Zhen,

Feng,

Yoo

2023

Environments

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To minimize the eutrophication pressure along the Gulf of Mexico or reduce the size of the hypoxic zone in the Gulf of Mexico, it is important to understand the underlying temporal and spatial variations and correlations in excess nutrient loads, which are strongly associated with the formation of hypoxia. This study’s objective was to reveal and visualize structures in high-dimensional datasets of nutrient yield distributions throughout the Mississippi/Atchafalaya River Basin (MARB). For this purpose, the annual mean nutrient concentrations were collected from thirty-three US Geological Survey (USGS) water stations scattered in the upper and lower MARB from 1996 to 2020. Eight surface water quality indicators were selected to make comparisons among water stations along the MARB over the past two decades. Principal component analysis (PCA) was used to comprehensively evaluate the nutrient yields across thirty-three USGS monitoring stations and identify the major contributing nutrient loads. The results showed that all samples could be analyzed using two main components, which accounted for 81.6% of the total variance. The PCA results showed that yields of orthophosphate (OP), silica (SI), nitrate–nitrites (NO3-NO2), and total suspended sediment (TSS) are major contributors to nutrient yields. It also showed that land-planted crops, density of population, domestic and industrial discharges, and precipitation are fundamental causes of excess nutrient loads in MARB. These factors are of great significance for the excess nutrient load management and pollution control of the Mississippi River. It was found that the average nutrient yields were stable within the sub-MARB area, but the large nitrogen yields in the upper MARB and the large phosphorus yields in the lower MARB were of great concern. t-distributed stochastic neighbor embedding (t-SNE) revealed interesting nonlinear and local structures in nutrient yield distributions. Clustering analysis (CA) showed the detailed development of similarities in the nutrient yield distribution. Moreover, PCA, t-SNE, and CA showed consistent clustering results. This study demonstrated that the integration of dimension reduction techniques, PCA, and t-SNE with CA techniques in machine learning are effective tools for the visualization of the structures of the correlations in high-dimensional datasets of nutrient yields and provide a comprehensive understanding of the correlations in the distributions of nutrient loads across the MARB.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The Gulf of Mexico encompasses over five million acres (about half of the U.S. total). Unfortunately, hypoxia in the Gulf of Mexico threatens the coastal economy, and the water quality is decreased due to the increasing municipal and manufacturing needs, which are destroying coastal wetland habitats at an alarming rate [1].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Structuring Nutrient Yields throughout Mississippi/Atchafalaya River Basin Using Machine Learning Approaches

Zhen,

Feng,

Yoo

2023

Environments

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Fisheries Forum

2022

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the Scripps Institution of Oceanography), chief science officer Chuck Wilson (former Louisiana Sea Grant director) and 18 additional members comprised of experts in relevant scientific disciplines (Zimmermann et al. 2021). All proposals were peer reviewed by subject matter experts chosen independently by the Consortium for Ocean Leadership (an organization whose members comprise most oceanographic institutions in the USA); grantees were encouraged to publish their findings in disciplineappropriate outlets, including a number of AFS journals.An important and novel stipulation of the Master Research Agreement between BP and GoMRI was that data sets resulting from research be available to the science community and public. Resultingly, for the over 1,700 peer-reviewed scientific papers published with GoMRI support, over 3,200 data sets are now freely available to the public through the Gulf of Mexico Research Initiative Information and Data Cooperative (Wilson et al. 2021). AFS might well consider emulating a similar repository for data from studies it publishes.In its 10 years, the GoMRI supported over 1,400 doctoral and graduate students (Wilson et al. 2021). The decade between 2010-2020 resulted in as many publications of Gulf of Mexico-relevant science as the previous 6 decades combined (McKinney et al. 2021), partly due to the infusion of GoMRI funding primarily into the Gulf's academic community. This gets to a larger issue of the historic underinvestment in Gulf science, highlighted by the large information gaps revealed during and after the Deepwater Horizon spill. AFS's policy missives should emphasize the importance of continued investments in science-in the Gulf and elsewhere-that support so many of the important societal challenges we face, and especially those at the nexus of energy, climate change, and fisheries.

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Setting an Environmental Baseline for the Deep-Sea Slope Offshore Northwestern Cuba (Southeastern Gulf of Mexico) Using Sediments and Nematode Diversity

Armenteros,

Marzo-Pérez,

Pérez-García

et al. 2024

Thalassas

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Deep-sea offshore northwestern Cuba is the less studied zone of the Gulf of Mexico (GoM). Our study aimed to set an environmental baseline and investigate a potential west-east gradient of sediment properties and nematode diversity along the northwestern Cuba. Sediments were collected by multicorer at nine sites in the insular slope between 974 and 1682 m depth. Sediment texture and composition showed a west-east gradient caused likely by narrowing of shelf width and increasing of downslope transport of terrigenous material. We found clear signatures of heavy metal pollution likely derived from Havana City but also from open-sky mining (Castellanos mining complex) and port dredging operations (Mariel). Nematode assemblages were dominated by the deep-sea genera: Acantholaimus, Metadasynemella, Desmodorella, Cervonema, Daptonema, Halalaimus, and Pselionema. α-diversity was about 20–50 genera and γ-diversity of about 100 genera. The β-diversity was substantial likely because small-scale patchiness of resources and heavy metals stress that increased assemblage variability. Individual weight decreased with depth indicating food-supply limitation in the deep sea; also, heavy metals were negatively correlated with weight suggesting deleterious effects on the growing. Our findings indicate that heavy metal pollution has reached deep-sea sediments and corroborate the long-range effects of anthropogenic activities on deep sea. Taxonomic diversity and biological traits (life strategy and trophic composition) constituted a powerful bioindicator of benthic health and benchmark for future potential disturbances in the region. Northwestern Cuba slope is still an understudied portion of the GoM and more research is needed to fully understand its biodiversity and biogeochemical patterns.

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The Gulf of Mexico: An Overview

Cited by 10 publications

References 70 publications

Structuring Nutrient Yields throughout Mississippi/Atchafalaya River Basin Using Machine Learning Approaches

Structuring Nutrient Yields throughout Mississippi/Atchafalaya River Basin Using Machine Learning Approaches

Fisheries Forum

Setting an Environmental Baseline for the Deep-Sea Slope Offshore Northwestern Cuba (Southeastern Gulf of Mexico) Using Sediments and Nematode Diversity

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