Impact of the slope angle of hummocks on the ride-up of finger ice in the Liaohe Estuary

The ride-up and pile-up of sea ice have effects on the ice load of marine structure. The ride-up angle is an important parameter to study the process of ride-up and to determine the possibility of the ride-up to occur. Some conclusions about the ride-up angle are drawn based on field-survey data in this paper. Thirty hummocks with full structure, formed by 0.4-1.6 cm ice layers, were investigated in the Liaohe Estuary of the north of Liaodong Bay. After analyzing the cross-sections of the pile-up body, some concfusions on the ride-up angle are reached. The results indicate that whether the ride-up occurs or not is associated with the slope angle of the hummock. If the slope angle is greater than 10.31°, the ride-up can take place. With the development of riding-up and piling-up, if the slope angle increases to 40.0°, the climbing-up process will stop and the drifting ice begins to accumulate in front of the hummock. The climbing process does not continue until a new slope angle, which is less than 28.0°, is formed. Meanwhile, the forming process of hummocks, which are made up of 10.0 cm or 22.0 cm ice layers, is proved to follow the rule.

Trade-off between leaf chlorophyll and betacyanins in Suaeda salsa in the Liaohe estuary wetland in northeast China

Aims Pigment composition is an important functional trait that can be affected by environmental factors.the objective of this study was to investigate the effect of soil salinity on pigment composition in Suaeda salsa by comparing chlorophyll and betacyanin content in the Liaohe estuary wetland,a typical coastal wetland in northeast China.Methods We investigated the plant biomass,percentage of red leaves and pigment content(chlorophyll a,chlorophyll b and betacyanins)in S.salsa in intertidal and supratidal zones of the upper,middle and lower reaches of the Liaohe estuary wetlands.the Na^(+)content of both the soil and plant was also measured.Full analysis of variance and multivariate analysis were used to compare differences in pig-ment content and Na^(+)content between the supratidal and intertidal zones.Important Findings Pigment composition was significantly affected by soil salinity.With increasing soil salinity,the percentage of red leaves was higher in the intertidal zone than in the supratidal zone.In all three reaches,plants had lower chlorophyll a content and higher betacyanin con-tent in the intertidal zone than in the supratidal zone.Compared to chlorophyll a,chlorophyll b was less sensitive to soil salinity.there were no differences in chlorophyll b content between the intertidal and supratidal zones in the upper and lower reaches.Furthermore,pigment composition was associated with both the plant tissue and soil Na^(+)content.Compared to the supratidal zone,the intertidal zone had a higher Na^(+)content in plants.there was a negative rela-tionship between plant chlorophyll content and soil Na^(+)content,but a positive relationship between betacyanin content and soil Na^(+)content.Overall,the results indicated that there might be a trade-off between leaf chlorophyll and betacyanin content in S.salsa to main-tain its growth and survival in high salinity environments.

Water Quality Evaluation in Tidal River Reaches of Liaohe River Estuary, China Using a Revised QUAL2K Model

Rivers in the Liaohe River Estuary area have been seriously polluted by discharges of wastewater containing petroleum pol- lutants and nutrients. In this paper, The Enhanced Stream Water Quality Model （QUAL2K） and its revised model as well as One-dimensional Tide Mean Model （1D model） were applied to predict and assess the water quality of the tidal fiver reach of the Liaohe River Estuary. Dissolved oxygen （DO）, biochemical oxygen demand （BODs）, ammonia nitrogen （NH3-N） and total phosphorus （TP） were chosen as water quality indices in the two model simulations. The modelled results show that the major reasons for degraded rivers remain petroleum and non-point source pollution. Tidal water also has a critical effect on the variation of water quality. The sensitivity analysis identifies that flow rate, point load and diffuse load are the most sensitive parameters for the four water quality indices in the revised QUAL2K simulation. Uncertainty analysis based on a Monte Carlo simulation gives the probability distribution of the four wa- ter quality indices at two locations （6.50 km and 44.84 km from the river mouth）. The statistical outcomes indicate that the observed data fall within the 90% confidence intervals at all sites measured, and show that the revised QUAL2K gives better results in simulating the water quality of a tidal fiver.

Seasonal implications for taxonomic sufficiency to simplify M-AMBI methodology in the coastal area adjacent to a eutrophic estuary

Taxonomic sufficiency(TS)refers to identifying taxa to a taxonomic level sufficient to detect community changes in stressed environments and may provide a cost-effective approach in routine monitoring programs.However,there is still limited information regarding the seasonal impact of applying TS and its implications for the ecological quality evaluation in the estuarine ecosystem.This study investigated the relationship between the multivariate-AZTI’s Marine Biotic Index(M-AMBI)and environmental variables in three seasons(i.e.,spring,summer,and autumn)in the Liaohe River Estuary.We tested the reliability of TS for simplifying the M-AMBI methodology.The results showed that family and genus level data could reproduce the spatial-temporal patterns of community structure at the species level.The M-AMBI values showed a consistent spatial distribution pattern in all sampling seasons,with a decreasing trend with the increasing distance from the estuary mouth.Both genus and family level data performed nearly as well as species level in detecting the seasonal variations of pollutants(i.e.,nutrients and total organic content).The family level M-AMBI was feasible to discern stress in the Liaohe River Estuary because of the high aggregation ratios at different taxonomic levels in all sampling seasons.These findings suggest that applying taxonomic sufficiency based on the M-AMBI provides an efficient approach for evaluating ecological quality in the Liaohe River Estuary.

Soil characteristics and ecological thresholds of Suaeda salsa wetlands

Suaeda salsa is an annual euhalophyte in estuarine wetlands.Soil properties of wetlands have an important influence on S.salsa growth.Therefore,the soil ecological thresholds is valuable for the restoration of degraded S.salsa wetlands.The objectives of this present study were to analyze the soil physicochemical properties and evaluate the soil ecological thresholds in the typical degraded areas for S.salsa growth.Soil text components became coarser with increased sand contents and less clay contents,as the higher degree of wetland degradation.Meanwhile,the salt contents in different soil depths gradually increased with the increased degree of degradation of wetlands.Evident changes in soil water content,organic matter content,and cations concentrations were not observed,while the concentrations of these factors were higher in the soil layer of 0-10 cm than those in the 20-30 cm.The soil pH in the 0-10 cm soil layer was lower than that in the 20-30 cm.The content of the three available nutrients did not change evidently with the increasing degree of degradation.The optimum thresholds of soil salinity and water content were 7.073-16.613 g/kg and 31.8-63.2%,respectively.