RESUMO
Lumps of crude oil residue floating the sea surface have been observed widely. Samples were taken with surface-skimming nets in the Mediter-ranean Sea and eastern North Atlantic Ocean; their displacement volumes were as large as 0.5 milliliter per square meter. An isopod, Idotea metallica, appears to be associated with the lumps, and a barnacle, Lepas pectinata, grows upon them. Lumps were found in stomachs of Scomberesox saurus, a surface-feeding fish importanit in ocean food webs. Films on the lumps, presumably consisting mostly of bacteria, consumed oxygen at the rate of 4 cubic millimeters per hour per square centimeter of lump surface. Chemical analysis suggested that certain lumps had been at large for only a few weeks; data from barnacle size and growth rate suggested that other lumps were at least 2 months old.
RESUMO
A sound-scattering layer, composed of discrete hyperbolic echosequences and apparently restricted to the Slope Water region of the western North Atlantic, has been identified from the Deep Submergence Research Vehicle Alvin with schools of the meyctophid fish Ceratoscopelus maderensis. By diving into the layer and using Alvin's echo-ranging sonar, we approached and visually identified the sound scatterers. The number of echo sequences observed with the surface echo-soutnder (1/23.76 x 10(5) cubic meters of water) checked roughly with the number of sonar targets observed from the submarine (1/7.45 x 105 cubic meters). The fish schools appeared to be 5 to 10 meters thick, 10 to 100 meters in diameter, and on centers 100 to 200 meters apart. Density within schools was estimated at 10 to 15 fish per cubic meter.
