1.
Suez Canal
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The Suez Canal is an artificial sea-level waterway in Egypt, connecting the Mediterranean Sea to the Red Sea through the Isthmus of Suez. It was constructed by the Suez Canal Company between 1859 and 1869, after 10 years of construction, it was officially opened on November 17,1869. It extends from the terminus of Port Said to the southern terminus of Port Tewfik at the city of Suez. Its length is 193.30 km, including its northern and southern access channels, in 2012,17,225 vessels traversed the canal. The original canal was a waterway with passing locations in the Ballah Bypass. It contains no locks system, with seawater flowing freely through it, in general, the canal north of the Bitter Lakes flows north in winter and south in summer. South of the lakes, the current changes with the tide at Suez, the canal is owned and maintained by the Suez Canal Authority of Egypt. Under the Convention of Constantinople, it may be used in time of war as in time of peace, by every vessel of commerce or of war, without distinction of flag. In August 2014, construction was launched to expand and widen the Ballah Bypass for 35 km to speed the canals transit time, the expansion was planned to double the capacity of the Suez Canal from 49 to 97 ships a day. At a cost of $8.4 billion, this project was funded with interest-bearing investment certificates issued exclusively to Egyptian entities, the New Suez Canal, as the expansion was dubbed, was opened with great fanfare in a ceremony on 6 August 2015. On 24 February 2016, the Suez Canal Authority officially opened the new side channel and this side channel, located at the northern side of the east extension of the Suez Canal, serves the East Terminal for berthing and unberthing vessels from the terminal anytime of day and night. Ancient west–east canals were built to travel from the Nile River to the Red Sea. One smaller canal is believed to have been constructed under the auspices of Senusret II or Ramesses II. Another canal, probably incorporating a portion of the first, was constructed under the reign of Necho II, the legendary Sesostris may have started work on an ancient canal joining the Nile with the Red Sea. In his Meteorology, Aristotle wrote, One of their kings tried to make a canal to it, so he first, and Darius afterwards, stopped making the canal, lest the sea should mix with the river water and spoil it. Strabo wrote that Sesostris started to build a canal, and Pliny the Elder wrote,165. Later the Persian king Darius had the idea, and yet again Ptolemy II. This proved to be the canal made by the Persian king Darius I
2.
Red Sea
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The Red Sea is a seawater inlet of the Indian Ocean, lying between Africa and Asia. The connection to the ocean is in the south through the Bab el Mandeb strait, to the north lie the Sinai Peninsula, the Gulf of Aqaba, and the Gulf of Suez. The Red Sea is a Global 200 ecoregion, the sea is underlain by the Red Sea Rift which is part of the Great Rift Valley. The Red Sea has an area of roughly 438,000 km2, is about 2250 km long and. It has a depth of 2211 m in the central median trench. However, there are also extensive shallow shelves, noted for their marine life, the sea is the habitat of over 1,000 invertebrate species, and 200 soft and hard corals. It is the worlds northernmost tropical sea, the International Hydrographic Organization defines the limits of the Red Sea as follows, On the North. The Southern limits of the Gulfs of Suez and Aqaba, a line joining Husn Murad and Ras Siyyan. Red Sea is a translation of the Greek Erythra Thalassa, Latin Mare Rubrum, Arabic, البحر الأحمر. Al-Baḥr Al-Aḥmar, Somali Badda Cas and Tigrinya Qeyyiḥ bāḥrī, the name of the sea may signify the seasonal blooms of the red-coloured Trichodesmium erythraeum near the waters surface. A theory favored by modern scholars is that the name red is referring to the direction south. The basis of this theory is that some Asiatic languages used color words to refer to the cardinal directions, herodotus on one occasion uses Red Sea and Southern Sea interchangeably. Historically, it was known to western geographers as Mare Mecca. Some ancient geographers called the Red Sea the Arabian Gulf or Gulf of Arabia. C, in that version, the Yam Suph is translated as Erythra Thalassa. The Red Sea is one of four seas named in English after common color terms — the others being the Black Sea, the White Sea and the Yellow Sea. The direct rendition of the Greek Erythra thalassa in Latin as Mare Erythraeum refers to the part of the Indian Ocean. The earliest known exploration of the Red Sea was conducted by ancient Egyptians, one such expedition took place around 2500 BC, and another around 1500 BC. Both involved long voyages down the Red Sea, historically, scholars argued whether these trips were possible
3.
Mediterranean Sea
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The sea is sometimes considered a part of the Atlantic Ocean, although it is usually identified as a separate body of water. The name Mediterranean is derived from the Latin mediterraneus, meaning inland or in the middle of land and it covers an approximate area of 2.5 million km2, but its connection to the Atlantic is only 14 km wide. The Strait of Gibraltar is a strait that connects the Atlantic Ocean to the Mediterranean Sea and separates Gibraltar. In oceanography, it is called the Eurafrican Mediterranean Sea or the European Mediterranean Sea to distinguish it from mediterranean seas elsewhere. The Mediterranean Sea has a depth of 1,500 m. The sea is bordered on the north by Europe, the east by Asia and it is located between latitudes 30° and 46° N and longitudes 6° W and 36° E. Its west-east length, from the Strait of Gibraltar to the Gulf of Iskenderun, the seas average north-south length, from Croatia’s southern shore to Libya, is approximately 800 km. The Mediterranean Sea, including the Sea of Marmara, has an area of approximately 2,510,000 square km. The sea was an important route for merchants and travelers of ancient times that allowed for trade, the history of the Mediterranean region is crucial to understanding the origins and development of many modern societies. In addition, the Gaza Strip and the British Overseas Territories of Gibraltar and Akrotiri, the term Mediterranean derives from the Latin word mediterraneus, meaning amid the earth or between land, as it is between the continents of Africa, Asia and Europe. The Ancient Greek name Mesogeios, is similarly from μέσο, between + γη, land, earth) and it can be compared with the Ancient Greek name Mesopotamia, meaning between rivers. The Mediterranean Sea has historically had several names, for example, the Carthaginians called it the Syrian Sea and latter Romans commonly called it Mare Nostrum, and occasionally Mare Internum. Another name was the Sea of the Philistines, from the people inhabiting a large portion of its shores near the Israelites, the sea is also called the Great Sea in the General Prologue by Geoffrey Chaucer. In Ottoman Turkish, it has also been called Bahr-i Sefid, in Modern Hebrew, it has been called HaYam HaTikhon, the Middle Sea, reflecting the Seas name in ancient Greek, Latin, and modern languages in both Europe and the Middle East. Similarly, in Modern Arabic, it is known as al-Baḥr al-Mutawassiṭ, in Turkish, it is known as Akdeniz, the White Sea since among Turks the white colour represents the west. Several ancient civilisations were located around the Mediterranean shores, and were influenced by their proximity to the sea. It provided routes for trade, colonisation, and war, as well as food for numerous communities throughout the ages, due to the shared climate, geology, and access to the sea, cultures centered on the Mediterranean tended to have some extent of intertwined culture and history. Two of the most notable Mediterranean civilisations in classical antiquity were the Greek city states, later, when Augustus founded the Roman Empire, the Romans referred to the Mediterranean as Mare Nostrum
4.
Fish
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A fish is any member of a group of animals that consist of all gill-bearing aquatic craniate animals that lack limbs with digits. They form a group to the tunicates, together forming the olfactores. Included in this definition are the living hagfish, lampreys, and cartilaginous, tetrapods emerged within lobe-finned fishes, so cladistically they are fish as well. However, traditionally fish are rendered obsolete or paraphyletic by excluding the tetrapods, because in this manner the term fish is defined negatively as a paraphyletic group, it is not considered a formal taxonomic grouping in systematic biology. The traditional term pisces is considered a typological, but not a phylogenetic classification, the earliest organisms that can be classified as fish were soft-bodied chordates that first appeared during the Cambrian period. Although they lacked a true spine, they possessed notochords which allowed them to be more agile than their invertebrate counterparts, fish would continue to evolve through the Paleozoic era, diversifying into a wide variety of forms. Many fish of the Paleozoic developed external armor that protected them from predators, the first fish with jaws appeared in the Silurian period, after which many became formidable marine predators rather than just the prey of arthropods. Fish are abundant in most bodies of water and they can be found in nearly all aquatic environments, from high mountain streams to the abyssal and even hadal depths of the deepest oceans. With 33,100 described species, fish exhibit greater species diversity than any group of vertebrates. Fish are an important resource for humans worldwide, especially as food, commercial and subsistence fishers hunt fish in wild fisheries or farm them in ponds or in cages in the ocean. They are also caught by fishers, kept as pets, raised by fishkeepers. Fish have had a role in culture through the ages, serving as deities, religious symbols, fish do not represent a monophyletic group, and therefore the evolution of fish is not studied as a single event. Early fish from the record are represented by a group of small, jawless. Jawless fish lineages are mostly extinct, an extant clade, the lampreys may approximate ancient pre-jawed fish. The first jaws are found in Placodermi fossils, the diversity of jawed vertebrates may indicate the evolutionary advantage of a jawed mouth. It is unclear if the advantage of a hinged jaw is greater biting force, improved respiration, fish may have evolved from a creature similar to a coral-like sea squirt, whose larvae resemble primitive fish in important ways. The first ancestors of fish may have kept the form into adulthood. Fish are a group, that is, any clade containing all fish also contains the tetrapods
5.
Crustacean
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Crustaceans form a large, diverse arthropod taxon which includes such familiar animals as crabs, lobsters, crayfish, shrimp, krill, woodlice and barnacles. In other words, some crustaceans are more related to insects. The 67,000 described species range in size from Stygotantulus stocki at 0.1 mm, to the Japanese spider crab with a leg span of up to 3.8 m, like other arthropods, crustaceans have an exoskeleton, which they moult to grow. Most crustaceans are free-living aquatic animals, but some are terrestrial, some are parasitic, the group has an extensive fossil record, reaching back to the Cambrian, and includes living fossils such as Triops cancriformis, which has existed apparently unchanged since the Triassic period. More than 10 million tons of crustaceans are produced by fishery or farming for human consumption, krill and copepods are not as widely fished, but may be the animals with the greatest biomass on the planet, and form a vital part of the food chain. The scientific study of crustaceans is known as carcinology, and a scientist who works in carcinology is a carcinologist, the body of a crustacean is composed of segments, which are grouped into three regions, the cephalon or head, the thorax, and the pleon or abdomen. The head and thorax may be fused together to form a cephalothorax, the crustacean body is protected by the hard exoskeleton, which must be moulted for the animal to grow. The shell around each somite can be divided into a dorsal tergum, ventral sternum, various parts of the exoskeleton may be fused together. The abdomen bears pleopods, and ends in a telson, which bears the anus, the number and variety of appendages in different crustaceans may be partly responsible for the groups success. It is unclear whether the condition is a derived state which evolved in crustaceans. Trilobites, for instance, also possessed biramous appendages, the main body cavity is an open circulatory system, where blood is pumped into the haemocoel by a heart located near the dorsum. Malacostraca have haemocyanin as the pigment, while copepods, ostracods, barnacles. The alimentary canal consists of a tube that often has a gizzard-like gastric mill for grinding food and a pair of digestive glands that absorb food. Structures that function as kidneys are located near the antennae, a brain exists in the form of ganglia close to the antennae, and a collection of major ganglia is found below the gut. In many decapods, the first pair of pleopods are specialised in the male for sperm transfer, many terrestrial crustaceans mate seasonally and return to the sea to release the eggs. Others, such as woodlice, lay their eggs on land, in most decapods, the females retain the eggs until they hatch into free-swimming larvae. Marine crustaceans are as ubiquitous in the oceans as insects are on land, some branchiurans are able to withstand rapid changes of salinity and will also switch hosts from marine to non-marine species. Krill are the layer and the most important part of the food chain in Antarctic animal communities
6.
Mollusca
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The molluscs compose the large phylum Mollusca of invertebrate animals. Around 85,000 extant species of molluscs are recognized, molluscs are the largest marine phylum, comprising about 23% of all the named marine organisms. Numerous molluscs also live in freshwater and terrestrial habitats and they are highly diverse, not just in size and in anatomical structure, but also in behaviour and in habitat. The phylum is divided into 9 or 10 taxonomic classes. The gastropods are by far the most numerous molluscs in terms of classified species, the three most universal features defining modern molluscs are a mantle with a significant cavity used for breathing and excretion, the presence of a radula, and the structure of the nervous system. Other than these things, molluscs express great morphological diversity, so many textbooks base their descriptions on an ancestral mollusc. This has a single, limpet-like shell on top, which is made of proteins and chitin reinforced with calcium carbonate, the underside of the animal consists of a single muscular foot. Although molluscs are coelomates, the coelom tends to be small, the main body cavity is a hemocoel through which blood circulates, their circulatory systems are mainly open. The generalized mollusc has two paired nerve cords, or three in bivalves, the brain, in species that have one, encircles the esophagus. Most molluscs have eyes, and all have sensors to detect chemicals, vibrations, the simplest type of molluscan reproductive system relies on external fertilization, but more complex variations occur. All produce eggs, from which may emerge trochophore larvae, more complex veliger larvae, good evidence exists for the appearance of gastropods, cephalopods and bivalves in the Cambrian period 541 to 485.4 million years ago. Molluscs have, for centuries, also been the source of important luxury goods, notably pearls, mother of pearl, Tyrian purple dye and their shells have also been used as money in some preindustrial societies. Mollusc species can also represent hazards or pests for human activities, the bite of the blue-ringed octopus is often fatal, and that of Octopus apollyon causes inflammation that can last for over a month. Stings from a few species of large tropical cone shells can also kill, schistosomiasis is transmitted to humans via water snail hosts, and affects about 200 million people. Snails and slugs can also be serious pests, and accidental or deliberate introduction of some snail species into new environments has seriously damaged some ecosystems. The words mollusc and mollusk are both derived from the French mollusque, which originated from the Latin molluscus, from mollis, molluscus was itself an adaptation of Aristotles τα μαλακά, the soft things, which he applied to cuttlefish. The scientific study of molluscs is accordingly called malacology, as it is now known these groups have no relation to molluscs, and very little to one another, the name Molluscoida has been abandoned. The most universal features of the structure of molluscs are a mantle with a significant cavity used for breathing and excretion
7.
Ecosystem
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An ecosystem is a community of living organisms in conjunction with the nonliving components of their environment, interacting as a system. These biotic and abiotic components are regarded as linked together through nutrient cycles, as ecosystems are defined by the network of interactions among organisms, and between organisms and their environment, they can be of any size but usually encompass specific, limited spaces. Energy, water, nitrogen and soil minerals are other essential components of an ecosystem. The energy that flows through ecosystems is obtained primarily from the sun and it generally enters the system through photosynthesis, a process that also captures carbon from the atmosphere. By feeding on plants and on one another, animals play an important role in the movement of matter and they also influence the quantity of plant and microbial biomass present. Ecosystems are controlled both by external and internal factors, other external factors include time and potential biota. Ecosystems are dynamic entities—invariably, they are subject to disturbances and are in the process of recovering from some past disturbance. Ecosystems in similar environments that are located in different parts of the world can have different characteristics simply because they contain different species. The introduction of species can cause substantial shifts in ecosystem function. Internal factors not only control ecosystem processes but are controlled by them and are often subject to feedback loops. Other internal factors include disturbance, succession and the types of species present, although humans exist and operate within ecosystems, their cumulative effects are large enough to influence external factors like climate. Biodiversity affects ecosystem function, as do the processes of disturbance, classifying ecosystems into ecologically homogeneous units is an important step towards effective ecosystem management, but there is no single, agreed-upon way to do this. The term ecosystem was first used in 1935 in a publication by British ecologist Arthur Tansley, Tansley devised the concept to draw attention to the importance of transfers of materials between organisms and their environment. He later refined the term, describing it as The whole system, including not only the organism-complex, but also the whole complex of physical factors forming what we call the environment. Tansley regarded ecosystems not simply as natural units, but as mental isolates, Tansley later defined the spatial extent of ecosystems using the term ecotope. G. Raymond Lindeman took these ideas one step further to suggest that the flow of energy through a lake was the driver of the ecosystem. Most mineral nutrients, on the hand, are recycled within ecosystems. Ecosystems are controlled both by external and internal factors, external factors, also called state factors, control the overall structure of an ecosystem and the way things work within it, but are not themselves influenced by the ecosystem
8.
Ferdinand de Lesseps
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Eventually, the project was bought out by the United States, which solved the medical problems and changed the design to a non-sea level canal with locks. The origins of de Lesseps family are traceable back as far as the end of the 14th century and his ancestors, it is believed, came from Spain, and settled at Bayonne during the regions occupation by the English. From the middle of the 18th century the ancestors of de Lesseps followed diplomatic careers and his uncle was ennobled by King Louis XVI, and his father was made a count by Emperor Napoleon I. His father, Mathieu de Lesseps, was in the service, his mother, Catherine de Grévigné, was Spanish on her mothers side. She was a daughter of Henri de Grevigné and wife Francisca Antonia Gallegos, Ferdinand de Lesseps was born November 19,1805 in Versailles, Yvelines. His first years were spent in Italy, where his father was occupied with his consular duties and he was educated at the College of Henry IV in Paris. From the age of 18 years to 20 he was employed in the department of the army. From 1825 to 1827 he acted as assistant vice-consul at Lisbon and this uncle was an old companion of Jean-François de La Pérouse and the only survivor of the expedition in which La Pérouse perished. Barthélemy de Lesseps had left the expedition in Kamchatka to travel to St Petersburg overland, in 1828 de Lesseps was sent as an assistant vice-consul to Tunis, where his father was consul-general. He aided the escape of Youssouff, pursued by the soldiers of the Bey, of whom he was one of the officers, Youssouff acknowledged this protection given by a Frenchman by distinguishing himself in the ranks of the French army at the time of the French conquest of Algeria. De Lesseps was also entrusted by his father with missions to Marshal Count Bertrand Clausel, the marshal wrote to Mathieu de Lesseps on 18 December 1830, I have had the pleasure of meeting your son, who gives promise of sustaining with great credit the name he bears. In 1832 de Lesseps was appointed vice-consul at Alexandria, while the vessel de Lesseps sailed to Egypt in was in quarantine at the Alexandrian lazaretto, M. This work struck de Lessepss imagination, and gave him the idea of constructing a canal across the African isthmus, because of this, de Lesseps received a warm welcome from the viceroy and became good friends with his son, Said Pasha. In 1833 de Lesseps was sent as consul to Cairo, and soon given the management of the consulate general at Alexandria. While he was there an epidemic of plague broke out and lasted for two years, resulting in the deaths of more than a third of the inhabitants of Cairo and Alexandria. During this time de Lesseps went from one city to the other and constantly displayed an admirable zeal, towards the close of the year 1837 he returned to France, and on 21 December married Mlle Agathe Delamalle, daughter of the government prosecuting attorney at the court of Angers. By this mariage de Lesseps became the father of five sons, Charles Théodore de Lesseps, Charles Aimé de Lesseps, Ferdinand Marie de Lesseps, Ferdinand Victor de Lesseps and Aimé Victor de Lesseps. In 1839 he was appointed consul at Rotterdam, and in the following year transferred to Málaga, in 1842 he was sent to Barcelona, and soon afterwards promoted to the grade of consul general
9.
France
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France, officially the French Republic, is a country with territory in western Europe and several overseas regions and territories. The European, or metropolitan, area of France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, Overseas France include French Guiana on the South American continent and several island territories in the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian oceans. France spans 643,801 square kilometres and had a population of almost 67 million people as of January 2017. It is a unitary republic with the capital in Paris. Other major urban centres include Marseille, Lyon, Lille, Nice, Toulouse, during the Iron Age, what is now metropolitan France was inhabited by the Gauls, a Celtic people. The area was annexed in 51 BC by Rome, which held Gaul until 486, France emerged as a major European power in the Late Middle Ages, with its victory in the Hundred Years War strengthening state-building and political centralisation. During the Renaissance, French culture flourished and a colonial empire was established. The 16th century was dominated by civil wars between Catholics and Protestants. France became Europes dominant cultural, political, and military power under Louis XIV, in the 19th century Napoleon took power and established the First French Empire, whose subsequent Napoleonic Wars shaped the course of continental Europe. Following the collapse of the Empire, France endured a succession of governments culminating with the establishment of the French Third Republic in 1870. Following liberation in 1944, a Fourth Republic was established and later dissolved in the course of the Algerian War, the Fifth Republic, led by Charles de Gaulle, was formed in 1958 and remains to this day. Algeria and nearly all the colonies became independent in the 1960s with minimal controversy and typically retained close economic. France has long been a centre of art, science. It hosts Europes fourth-largest number of cultural UNESCO World Heritage Sites and receives around 83 million foreign tourists annually, France is a developed country with the worlds sixth-largest economy by nominal GDP and ninth-largest by purchasing power parity. In terms of household wealth, it ranks fourth in the world. France performs well in international rankings of education, health care, life expectancy, France remains a great power in the world, being one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council with the power to veto and an official nuclear-weapon state. It is a member state of the European Union and the Eurozone. It is also a member of the Group of 7, North Atlantic Treaty Organization, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, the World Trade Organization, originally applied to the whole Frankish Empire, the name France comes from the Latin Francia, or country of the Franks
10.
Invasive species
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One study pointed out widely divergent perceptions of the criteria for invasive species among researchers and concerns with the subjectivity of the term invasive. Such invasive species may be either plants or animals and may disrupt by dominating a region, wilderness areas, particular habitats and this includes non-native invasive plant species labeled as exotic pest plants and invasive exotics growing in native plant communities. It has been used in this sense by government organizations as well as groups such as the International Union for Conservation of Nature. The European Union defines Invasive Alien Species as those that are, firstly, outside their natural distribution area and it is also used by land managers, botanists, researchers, horticulturalists, conservationists, and the public for noxious weeds. The kudzu vine, Andean Pampas grass, and yellow starthistle are examples, an alternate usage broadens the term to include indigenous or native species along with non-native species, that have colonized natural areas. Deer are an example, considered to be overpopulating their native zones and adjacent suburban gardens, by some in the Northeastern, sometimes the term is used to describe a non-native or introduced species that has become widespread. However, not every introduced species has adverse effects on the environment, a nonadverse example is the common goldfish, which is found throughout the United States, but rarely achieves high densities. Scientists include species and ecosystem factors among the mechanisms that when combined, while all species compete to survive, invasive species appear to have specific traits or specific combinations of traits that allow them to outcompete native species. In some cases, the competition is about rates of growth, in other cases, species interact with each other more directly. Researchers disagree about the usefulness of traits as invasiveness markers, one study found that of a list of invasive and noninvasive species, 86% of the invasive species could be identified from the traits alone. Another study found invasive species tended to have only a subset of the presumed traits. Repeated patterns of movement, such as ships sailing to and from ports or cars driving up. An introduced species might become if it can outcompete native species for resources such as nutrients, light, physical space, water. If these species evolved under great competition or predation, then the new environment may host fewer able competitors, allowing the invader to proliferate quickly. Ecosystems in which are being used to their fullest capacity by native species can be modeled as zero-sum systems in which any gain for the invader is a loss for the native, however, such unilateral competitive superiority is not the rule. For example, barbed goatgrass was introduced to California on serpentine soils, which have low water-retention, low nutrient levels, a high magnesium/calcium ratio, and possible heavy metal toxicity. Plant populations on these soils tend to low density, but goatgrass can form dense stands on these soils. Some species, like Kalanchoe daigremontana, produce allelopathic compounds, that might have an effect on competing species
11.
Abiotic component
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In biology and ecology, abiotic components or abiotic factors are non-living chemical and physical parts of the environment that affect living organisms and the functioning of ecosystems. Abiotic factors and phenomena associated with them underpin all biology, abiotic components include physical conditions and non-living resources that affect living organisms in terms of growth, maintenance, and reproduction. Resources are distinguished as substances or objects in the environment required by one organism, component degradation of a substance occurs by chemical or physical processes, e. g. hydrolysis. All non-living components of an ecosystem, such as the atmosphere or water, are called abiotic components, in biology, abiotic factors can include water, light, radiation, temperature, humidity, atmosphere, and soil. The macroscopic climate often influences each of the above, pressure and sound waves may also be considered in the context of marine or sub-terrestrial environments. All of these factors affect different organisms to different extents, if there is little or no sunlight then plants may wither and die from not being able to get enough sunlight to complete the cycle of photosynthesis. Many Archea require very high temperatures, or pressures, or unusual concentrations of substances, such as sulfur. Certain fungi have evolved to survive mostly at the temperature, the humidity, for example, there is a significant difference in access to water as well as humidity between temperate rain forests and deserts. This difference in water causes a diversity in the types of plants. Biotic component, a part of an ecosystem that affects. Abiogenesis, the transformation of non-living into living matter
12.
Human impact on the environment
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Human impact on the environment or anthropogenic impact on the environment includes impacts on biophysical environments, biodiversity, and other resources. The term anthropogenic designates an effect or object resulting from human activity, the atmospheric scientist Paul Crutzen introduced the term Anthropocene in the mid-1970s. The term is used in the context of pollution emissions that are produced as a result of human activities but applies broadly to all major human impacts on the environment. Environmental impacts caused by the application of technology are often perceived as unavoidable for several reasons, third, according to the second law of thermodynamics, order can be increased within a system only by increasing disorder or entropy outside the system. Thus, technologies can create “order” in the economy only at the expense of increasing “disorder” in the environment. According to a number of studies, increased entropy is likely to be correlated to environmental impacts. The environmental impact of agriculture based on the wide variety of agricultural practices employed around the world. Ultimately, the impact depends on the production practices of the system used by farmers. The connection between emissions into the environment and the system is indirect, as it also depends on other climate variables such as rainfall. An example of a means-based indicator would be the quality of groundwater, an indicator reflecting the loss of nitrate to groundwater would be effect-based. The environmental impact of agriculture involves a variety of factors from the soil, to water, the air, animal and soil diversity, plants, and the food itself. Some of the issues that are related to agriculture are climate change, deforestation, genetic engineering, irrigation problems, pollutants, soil degradation. These conservation issues are part of conservation, and are addressed in fisheries science programs. There is a gap between how many fish are available to be caught and humanity’s desire to catch them, a problem that gets worse as the world population grows. The journal Science published a study in November 2006, which predicted that, at prevailing trends. Many countries, such as Tonga, the United States, Australia and New Zealand, the impacts stem from the changed hydrological conditions owing to the installation and operation of the scheme. An irrigation scheme draws water from the river and distributes it over the irrigated area. These may be called direct effects, effects on soil and water quality are indirect and complex, and subsequent impacts on natural, ecological and socio-economic conditions are intricate
13.
Ecology
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Ecology is the scientific analysis and study of interactions among organisms and their environment. It is a field that includes biology, geography. Ecology includes the study of interactions that organisms have with other, other organisms. Ecosystems are composed of dynamically interacting parts including organisms, the communities make up. Ecosystem processes, such as production, pedogenesis, nutrient cycling. These processes are sustained by organisms with specific life history traits, biodiversity, which refers to the varieties of species, genes, and ecosystems, enhances certain ecosystem services. Ecology is not synonymous with environment, environmentalism, natural history and it is closely related to evolutionary biology, genetics, and ethology. An important focus for ecologists is to improve the understanding of how biodiversity affects ecological function, Ecology is a human science as well. For example, the Circles of Sustainability approach treats ecology as more than the environment out there and it is not treated as separate from humans. Organisms and resources compose ecosystems which, in turn, maintain biophysical feedback mechanisms that moderate processes acting on living and non-living components of the planet, the word ecology was coined in 1866 by the German scientist Ernst Haeckel. Ecological thought is derivative of established currents in philosophy, particularly from ethics and politics, ancient Greek philosophers such as Hippocrates and Aristotle laid the foundations of ecology in their studies on natural history. Modern ecology became a more rigorous science in the late 19th century. Evolutionary concepts relating to adaptation and natural selection became the cornerstones of modern ecological theory, the scope of ecology contains a wide array of interacting levels of organization spanning micro-level to a planetary scale phenomena. Ecosystems, for example, contain abiotic resources and interacting life forms, an ecosystems area can vary greatly, from tiny to vast. A single tree is of consequence to the classification of a forest ecosystem. Several generations of a population can exist over the lifespan of a single leaf. Each of those aphids, in turn, support diverse bacterial communities, biodiversity describes the diversity of life from genes to ecosystems and spans every level of biological organization. The term has several interpretations, and there are ways to index, measure, characterize
14.
Bitter Lakes
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The Great Bitter Lake is a saltwater lake in Egypt, connected to the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea via the Suez Canal. It is connected to the Small Bitter Lake, through which the canal also runs, before the canal was built, the site was a dry salt valley or basin. References are made to the Great Bitter Lake in the ancient Pyramid Texts, ships traveling through the Suez Canal use the Great Bitter Lake as a passing lane, where they can change their position in line or turn around. When the Suez Canal was closed, during the war, the salinity of the lake increased substantially, the salinity of the lake depends on how much fresh water flows into it from the Red Sea and the Mediterranean Sea. As the canal has no locks, sea water flows freely into the lake from the Mediterranean, in general, north of the lakes the current reverses seasonally, being north-going in winter and south-going in summer. South of the lakes, the current is tidal, reversing with the tides in the Red Sea, fish can migrate, generally in a northerly direction, through the canal and lakes in what is known as a Lessepsian migration. This means that some Red Sea species have come to colonize the eastern Mediterranean, on 14 February 1945, Great Bitter Lake was the site of the Quincy Agreement. President Roosevelts interpreter was U. S. Marine Corps Colonel Bill Eddy who recorded the conversation in his book FDR Meets Ibn Saud. The meeting is the subject of a BBC documentary by Adam Curtis, during the Six-Day War in 1967, the canal was closed, leaving 15 ships trapped in the lake until 1975. These ships became known as the Yellow Fleet, because of the sands which soon covered their decks. The crews of the ships would eventually organize, share resources, two German-flagged ships eventually sailed out of the canal on their own power. Stranded cargo included various perishables, T-shirts, and a load of toys destined for Woolworths
15.
Hypersaline lake
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A hypersaline lake is a landlocked body of water that contains significant concentrations of sodium chloride or other salts, with saline levels surpassing that of ocean water. Specific microbial and crustacean species thrive in high salinity environments that are inhospitable to most lifeforms. Some of these species enter a dormant state when desiccated, the water of hypersaline lakes has great buoyancy due to a high salt content. The most saline water body in the world is the Don Juan Pond and its volume is some 3,000 cubic meters, but is constantly changing. The Don Juan Pond has a salinity level of over 44% and its high salinity prevents the Don Juan from freezing even when temperatures are below −50 °C. There are larger water bodies, lakes in the McMurdo Dry Valleys such as Lake Vanda with salinity of over 35%. They are covered with ice in the winter, the most saline lake outside of Antarctica is Lake Assal, in Djibouti, which has a salinity of 34. 8%. Probably the best-known hypersaline lakes are the Dead Sea and the Great Salt Lake, the Dead Sea, dividing Israel and the Palestinian West Bank from Jordan, is the worlds deepest hypersaline lake and the Araruama Lagoon is the worlds largest hypersaline lake. The Great Salt Lake, located in Utah, while having three times the surface area of the Dead Sea, is shallower and experiences much greater fluctuations in level than the Dead Sea. At its lowest recorded levels, it approaches 7.7 times the salinity of ocean water, hypersaline lakes are found on every continent, especially in arid or semi-arid regions. Brine pool Halocline Halophile List of bodies of water by salinity Salt lake
16.
Salinity
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Salinity is the saltiness or amount of salt dissolved in a body of water. This is usually measured in g salt k g sea water, a contour line of constant salinity is called an isohaline – or sometimes isohale. Salinity in rivers, lakes, and the ocean is conceptually simple, conceptually the salinity is the quantity of dissolved salt content of the water. Salts are compounds like sodium chloride, magnesium sulfate, potassium nitrate, the concentration of dissolved chloride ions is sometimes referred to as chlorinity. Operationally, dissolved matter is defined as that which can pass through a fine filter. Salinity can be expressed in the form of a mass fraction, Seawater typically has a mass salinity of around 35 g/kg, although lower values are typical near coasts where rivers enter the ocean. Rivers and lakes can have a range of salinities, from less than 0.01 g/kg to a few g/kg. The Dead Sea has a salinity of more than 200 g/kg, whatever pore size is used in the definition, the resulting salinity value of a given sample of natural water will not vary by more than a few percent. A bottled seawater product known as IAPSO Standard Seawater is used by oceanographers to standardize their measurements with enough precision to meet this requirement, measurement and definition difficulties arise because natural waters contain a complex mixture of many different elements from different sources in different molecular forms. The chemical properties of some of these depend on temperature and pressure. Many of these forms are difficult to measure with high accuracy, different practical definitions of salinity result from different attempts to account for these problems, to different levels of precision, while still remaining reasonably easy to use. For many purposes this sum can be limited to a set of eight major ions in natural waters, the major ions dominate the inorganic composition of most natural waters. Exceptions include some pit lakes and waters from some hydrothermal springs, the concentrations of dissolved gases like oxygen and nitrogen are not usually included in descriptions of salinity. However, carbon dioxide gas, which when dissolved is partially converted into carbonates and bicarbonates, is often included. Silicon in the form of acid, which usually appears as a neutral molecule in the pH range of most natural waters. The term salinity is, for oceanographers, usually associated with one of a set of measurement techniques. As the dominant techniques evolve, so do different descriptions of salinity, the distinctions between these different descriptions are important to physical oceanographers but are obscure and confusing to nonspecialists. Salinities were largely measured using titration-based techniques before the 1980s, titration with silver nitrate could be used to determine the concentration of halide ions to give a chlorinity
17.
Indian Ocean
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The Indian Ocean is the third largest of the worlds oceanic divisions, covering 70,560,000 km2. It is bounded by Asia on the north, on the west by Africa, on the east by Australia, the Indian Ocean is known as Ratnākara, the mine of gems in ancient Sanskrit literature, and as Hind Mahāsāgar, in Hindi. The northernmost extent of the Indian Ocean is approximately 30° north in the Persian Gulf, the oceans continental shelves are narrow, averaging 200 kilometres in width. An exception is found off Australias western coast, where the width exceeds 1,000 kilometres. The average depth of the ocean is 3,890 m and its deepest point is Diamantina Deep in Diamantina Trench, at 8,047 m deep, Sunda Trench has a depth of 7, 258–7,725 m. North of 50° south latitude, 86% of the basin is covered by pelagic sediments. The remaining 14% is layered with terrigenous sediments, glacial outwash dominates the extreme southern latitudes. The major choke points include Bab el Mandeb, Strait of Hormuz, the Lombok Strait, the Strait of Malacca, the Indian Ocean is artificially connected to the Mediterranean Sea through the Suez Canal, which is accessible via the Red Sea. All of the Indian Ocean is in the Eastern Hemisphere and the centre of the Eastern Hemisphere is in this ocean, marginal seas, gulfs, bays and straits of the Indian Ocean include, The climate north of the equator is affected by a monsoon climate. Strong north-east winds blow from October until April, from May until October south, in the Arabian Sea the violent Monsoon brings rain to the Indian subcontinent. In the southern hemisphere, the winds are milder. When the monsoon winds change, cyclones sometimes strike the shores of the Arabian Sea, the Indian Ocean is the warmest ocean in the world. Long-term ocean temperature records show a rapid, continuous warming in the Indian Ocean, Indian Ocean warming is the largest among the tropical oceans, and about 3 times faster than the warming observed in the Pacific. Research indicates that human induced greenhouse warming, and changes in the frequency, among the few large rivers flowing into the Indian Ocean are the Zambezi, Shatt al-Arab, Indus, Godavari, Krishna, Narmada, Ganges, Brahmaputra, Jubba and Irrawaddy River. The oceans currents are controlled by the monsoon. Two large gyres, one in the northern hemisphere flowing clockwise and one south of the equator moving anticlockwise, during the winter monsoon, however, currents in the north are reversed. Deep water circulation is controlled primarily by inflows from the Atlantic Ocean, the Red Sea, north of 20° south latitude the minimum surface temperature is 22 °C, exceeding 28 °C to the east. Southward of 40° south latitude, temperatures drop quickly, surface water salinity ranges from 32 to 37 parts per 1000, the highest occurring in the Arabian Sea and in a belt between southern Africa and south-western Australia
18.
Atlantic Ocean
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The Atlantic Ocean is the second largest of the worlds oceans with a total area of about 106,460,000 square kilometres. It covers approximately 20 percent of the Earths surface and about 29 percent of its surface area. It separates the Old World from the New World, the Atlantic Ocean occupies an elongated, S-shaped basin extending longitudinally between Eurasia and Africa to the east, and the Americas to the west. The Equatorial Counter Current subdivides it into the North Atlantic Ocean, in contrast, the term Atlantic originally referred specifically to the Atlas Mountains in Morocco and the sea off the Strait of Gibraltar and the North African coast. The Greek word thalassa has been reused by scientists for the huge Panthalassa ocean that surrounded the supercontinent Pangaea hundreds of years ago. The term Aethiopian Ocean, derived from Ancient Ethiopia, was applied to the Southern Atlantic as late as the mid-19th century, many Irish or British people refer to the United States and Canada as across the pond, and vice versa. The Black Atlantic refers to the role of ocean in shaping black peoples history. Irish migration to the US is meant when the term The Green Atlantic is used, the term Red Atlantic has been used in reference to the Marxian concept of an Atlantic working class, as well as to the Atlantic experience of indigenous Americans. Correspondingly, the extent and number of oceans and seas varies, the Atlantic Ocean is bounded on the west by North and South America. It connects to the Arctic Ocean through the Denmark Strait, Greenland Sea, Norwegian Sea, to the east, the boundaries of the ocean proper are Europe, the Strait of Gibraltar and Africa. In the southeast, the Atlantic merges into the Indian Ocean, the 20° East meridian, running south from Cape Agulhas to Antarctica defines its border. In the 1953 definition it extends south to Antarctica, while in later maps it is bounded at the 60° parallel by the Southern Ocean, the Atlantic has irregular coasts indented by numerous bays, gulfs, and seas. Including these marginal seas the coast line of the Atlantic measures 111,866 km compared to 135,663 km for the Pacific. Including its marginal seas, the Atlantic covers an area of 106,460,000 km2 or 23. 5% of the ocean and has a volume of 310,410,900 km3 or 23. 3%. Excluding its marginal seas, the Atlantic covers 81,760,000 km2 and has a volume of 305,811,900 km3, the North Atlantic covers 41,490,000 km2 and the South Atlantic 40,270,000 km2. The average depth is 3,646 m and the maximum depth, the bathymetry of the Atlantic is dominated by a submarine mountain range called the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. It runs from 87°N or 300 km south of the North Pole to the subantarctic Bouvet Island at 42°S, the MAR divides the Atlantic longitudinally into two halves, in each of which a series of basins are delimited by secondary, transverse ridges. The MAR reaches above 2000 m along most of its length, the MAR is a barrier for bottom water, but at these two transform faults deep water currents can pass from one side to the other
19.
Aswan Dam
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The Aswan Dam, or more specifically since the 1960s, the Aswan High Dam, is an embankment dam built across the Nile in Aswan, Egypt between 1960 and 1970. Its significance largely eclipsed the previous Aswan Low Dam initially completed in 1902 downstream, like the earlier implementation, the High Dam has had a significant effect on the economy and culture of Egypt. Since this natural flooding varied however, high-water years could destroy the crop, while low-water years could create widespread drought. Both these events had continued to occur periodically, with the greatly increased reservoir storage provided by the High Aswan Dam, the floods could be controlled and the water could be stored for later release over multiple years. His field work convinced him of the impracticality of this scheme, the British began construction of the first dam across the Nile in 1898. Construction lasted until 1902, and the dam was opened on 10 December 1902, the project was designed by Sir William Willcocks and involved several eminent engineers, including Sir Benjamin Baker and Sir John Aird, whose firm, John Aird & Co. was the main contractor. In 1912, the Greek-Egyptian engineer Adrian Daninos began to develop the plan of the new Aswan Dam, although the Low Dam was almost overtopped in 1946, the Egyptian government of King Farouk showed no interest in Daninoss plans. Instead the Nile Valley Plan by the British hydrologist Harold Edwin Hurst to store water in Sudan and Ethiopia, the Egyptian position changed completely with the overthrow of the monarchy, led by the Free Officers Movement including Gamal Abdel Nasser. The Free Officers were convinced that the Nile Waters had to be stored in Egypt for political reasons, and within two months, the plan of Daninos was accepted. Initially, both the U. S. A. and the USSR were interested in helping the development of the dam, but this movement happened in the midst of the Cold War, as well as of growing intra-Arab rivalries. At that time the U. S. feared that communism would spread to the Middle East, america and Britain offered to help finance construction of the High Dam, with a loan of $270 million, in return for Nassers leadership in resolving the Arab-Israeli conflict. While opposed both to communism, capitalism, and imperialism, Nasser presented himself as a tactical neutralist, in addition to his development plans, he looked to quickly modernize his military, and he turned first to the U. S. Nasser did not accept these conditions, but then he looked to the USSR for support, on 27 September 1955, Nasser announced an arms deal, with Czechoslovakia acting as a middleman for the Soviet support. Instead of attacking Nasser for turning to the Soviets, Dulles sought to improve relations with him and this explains the later offer of December 1955, in which the U. S. and Britain pledged $56 and $14 million respectively towards the construction of the dam. Though the Czech arms deal actually increased the American willingness to invest at Aswan, what angered Dulles much more was Nassers diplomatic recognition of China, which was in direct conflict with Dulless policy of containment. There are several reasons why the U. S. decided to withdraw its offer of funding. Dulles believed that the USSR would not fulfill its commitment to help the Egyptians and he was also irritated by Nassers neutrality and attempts to play both sides of the Cold War. At the time, other western allies in the Middle East, including Turkey and Iraq, were irritated and jealous that Egypt, in June 1956, the Soviets offered Nasser $1.12 billion at 2% interest for the construction of the dam
20.
Nile
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The Nile is a major north-flowing river in northeastern Africa. It is generally regarded as the longest river in the world, in particular, the Nile is the primary water source of Egypt and Sudan. The Nile has two tributaries, the White Nile and Blue Nile. The White Nile is considered to be the headwaters and primary stream of the Nile itself, the Blue Nile, however, is the source of most of the water and silt. The White Nile is longer and rises in the Great Lakes region of central Africa and it flows north through Tanzania, Lake Victoria, Uganda and South Sudan. The Blue Nile begins at Lake Tana in Ethiopia and flows into Sudan from the southeast, the two rivers meet just north of the Sudanese capital of Khartoum. The northern section of the river flows north almost entirely through the Sudanese desert to Egypt, then ends in a large delta, Egyptian civilization and Sudanese kingdoms have depended on the river since ancient times. Most of the population and cities of Egypt lie along those parts of the Nile valley north of Aswan, in the ancient Egyptian language, the Nile is called Ḥpī or Iteru, meaning river. In Coptic, the words piaro or phiaro meaning the river come from the ancient name. The English name Nile and the Arabic names en-Nîl and an-Nîl both derive from the Latin Nilus and the Ancient Greek Νεῖλος, beyond that, however, the etymology is disputed. One possible etymology derives it from a Semitic Nahal, meaning river, the standard English names White Nile and Blue Nile, to refer to the rivers source, derive from Arabic names formerly applied only to the Sudanese stretches which meet at Khartoum. Above Khartoum, the Nile is also known as the White Nile, at Khartoum the river is joined by the Blue Nile. The White Nile starts in equatorial East Africa, and the Blue Nile begins in Ethiopia, both branches are on the western flanks of the East African Rift. The drainage basin of the Nile covers 3,254,555 square kilometers, the source of the Nile is sometimes considered to be Lake Victoria, but the lake has feeder rivers of considerable size. It is either the Ruvyironza, which emerges in Bururi Province, Burundi, or the Nyabarongo, the two feeder rivers meet near Rusumo Falls on the Rwanda-Tanzania border. Gish Abay is reportedly the place where the water of the first drops of the Blue Nile develop. The Nile leaves Lake Nyanza at Ripon Falls near Jinja, Uganda and it flows north for some 130 kilometers, to Lake Kyoga. For the remaining part it flows westerly through the Murchison Falls until it reaches the very northern shores of Lake Albert where it forms a significant river delta
21.
Biogeography
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Biogeography is the study of the distribution of species and ecosystems in geographic space and through time. Organisms and biological communities often vary in a regular fashion along geographic gradients of latitude, elevation, isolation, phytogeography is the branch of biogeography that studies the distribution of plants. Zoogeography is the branch that studies distribution of animals, Biogeography is an integrative field of inquiry that unites concepts and information from ecology, evolutionary biology, geology, and physical geography. The short-term interactions within a habitat and species of organisms describe the application of biogeography. Historical biogeography describes the long-term, evolutionary periods of time for broader classifications of organisms, early scientists, beginning with Carl Linnaeus, contributed theories to the contributions of the development of biogeography as a science. Beginning in the century, Europeans explored the world and discovered the biodiversity of life. Linnaeus initiated the ways to classify organisms through his exploration of undiscovered territories, the patterns of species distribution across geographical areas can usually be explained through a combination of historical factors such as, speciation, extinction, continental drift, and glaciation. Through observing the distribution of species, we can see associated variations in sea level, river routes, habitat. Additionally, this science considers the constraints of landmass areas and isolation. As writer David Quammen put it. biogeography does more than ask Which species, and, what is sometimes more crucial, Why not. Modern biogeography often employs the use of Geographic Information Systems, to understand the factors affecting organism distribution, often mathematical models and GIS are employed to solve ecological problems that have a spatial aspect to them. Biogeography is most keenly observed on the worlds islands and these habitats are often much more manageable areas of study because they are more condensed than larger ecosystems on the mainland. They can then apply their understanding to similar but more complex mainland habitats, Islands are very diverse in their biomes, ranging from the tropical to arctic climates. This diversity in habitat allows for a range of species study in different parts of the world. One scientist who recognized the importance of geographic locations was Charles Darwin. Two chapters in On the Origin of Species were devoted to geographical distribution, the first discoveries that contributed to the development of biogeography as a science began in the mid-18th century, as Europeans explored the world and discovered the biodiversity of life. During the 18th century most views on the world were shaped around religion and for many natural theologists, Carl Linnaeus, in the mid-18th century, initiated the ways to classify organisms through his exploration of undiscovered territories. When he noticed that species were not as perpetual as he believed, when Noah’s ark landed on Mount Ararat and the waters receded, the animals dispersed throughout different elevations on the mountain
22.
Continental drift
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Continental drift is the movement of the Earths continents relative to each other, thus appearing to drift across the ocean bed. The speculation that continents might have drifted was first put forward by Abraham Ortelius in 1596, the concept was independently and more fully developed by Alfred Wegener in 1912, but his theory was rejected by some for lack of a mechanism and others because of prior theoretical commitments. The idea of continental drift has been subsumed by the theory of plate tectonics, W. J. Kious described Ortelius thoughts in this way, Abraham Ortelius in his work Thesaurus Geographicus. Suggested that the Americas were torn away from Europe and Africa, by earthquakes and floods and went on to say, The vestiges of the rupture reveal themselves, if someone brings forward a map of the world and considers carefully the coasts of the three. In his Manual of Geology,1863, Dana says The continents, Dana was enormously influential in America – his Manual of Mineralogy is still in print in revised form – and the theory became known as Permanence theory. This suggested that the oceans were a permanent feature of the earths surface and this led Mantovani to propose an Expanding Earth theory which has since been shown to be incorrect. Continental drift without expansion was proposed by Frank Bursley Taylor, who suggested in 1908 that the continents were moved into their present positions by a process of continental creep. Wegener said that of all theories, Taylors, although not fully developed, had the most similarities to his own. In the mid-20th century, the theory of drift was referred to as the Taylor-Wegener hypothesis. Alfred Wegener first presented his hypothesis to the German Geological Society on January 6,1912 and his hypothesis was that the continents had once formed a single landmass, called Pangea, before breaking apart and drifting to their present locations. Wegener was the first to use the continental drift and formally publish the hypothesis that the continents had somehow drifted apart. Although he presented evidence for continental drift, he was unable to provide a convincing explanation for the physical processes which might have caused this drift. The Polflucht hypothesis was studied by Paul Sophus Epstein in 1920. The theory of drift was not accepted for many years. One problem was that a driving force was missing. A second problem was that Wegeners estimate of the velocity of continental motion,250 cm/year, was implausibly high, and it did not help that Wegener was not a geologist. Other geologists also believed that the evidence that Wegener had provided was not sufficient, the British geologist Arthur Holmes championed the theory of continental drift at a time when it was deeply unfashionable. He proposed in 1931 that the Earths mantle contained convection cells that dissipated radioactive heat and his Principles of Physical Geology, ending with a chapter on continental drift, was published in 1944
23.
Egypt
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Egypt, officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia by a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. Egypt is a Mediterranean country bordered by the Gaza Strip and Israel to the northeast, the Gulf of Aqaba to the east, the Red Sea to the east and south, Sudan to the south, and Libya to the west. Across the Gulf of Aqaba lies Jordan, and across from the Sinai Peninsula lies Saudi Arabia, although Jordan and it is the worlds only contiguous Afrasian nation. Egypt has among the longest histories of any country, emerging as one of the worlds first nation states in the tenth millennium BC. Considered a cradle of civilisation, Ancient Egypt experienced some of the earliest developments of writing, agriculture, urbanisation, organised religion and central government. One of the earliest centres of Christianity, Egypt was Islamised in the century and remains a predominantly Muslim country. With over 92 million inhabitants, Egypt is the most populous country in North Africa and the Arab world, the third-most populous in Africa, and the fifteenth-most populous in the world. The great majority of its people live near the banks of the Nile River, an area of about 40,000 square kilometres, the large regions of the Sahara desert, which constitute most of Egypts territory, are sparsely inhabited. About half of Egypts residents live in areas, with most spread across the densely populated centres of greater Cairo, Alexandria. Modern Egypt is considered to be a regional and middle power, with significant cultural, political, and military influence in North Africa, the Middle East and the Muslim world. Egypts economy is one of the largest and most diversified in the Middle East, Egypt is a member of the United Nations, Non-Aligned Movement, Arab League, African Union, and Organisation of Islamic Cooperation. Miṣr is the Classical Quranic Arabic and modern name of Egypt. The name is of Semitic origin, directly cognate with other Semitic words for Egypt such as the Hebrew מִצְרַיִם, the oldest attestation of this name for Egypt is the Akkadian
24.
Bluespotted cornetfish
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The bluespotted cornetfish, smooth cornetfish, or smooth flutemouth, Fistularia commersonii, is a marine fish which belongs to the family Fistulariidae. This very long and slender reef-dweller belongs to the order as the pipefishes and seahorses. It is widespread in the tropical and sub-tropical waters of the Indo-Pacific, in 2000 its presence was reported in the Mediterranean Sea, since when it has continued to disperse and is now well-established in some areas. This species is considered as part of the Lessepsian migration, the fish is of minor importance commercially, mostly being sold as fish meal but also fresh and preserved. It is also sold as an aquarium fish, the bluespotted cornetfish is notable for its unusually long, slender body shape. It has a snout, large eyes and a long tail filament lined with sensory pores which may help with detecting prey. Its body is greenish-grey to brown with two blue stripes or lines of dots on the back and lighter on the front. It grows to a length of 1.6 m, the bluespotted cornetfish is usually a solitary predator, stalking and feeding on small fishes, crustaceans and squid. Sometimes they feed in groups along the bottom on small bottom-dwelling fish which their long snouts are very efficient at sucking up. Reproduction is oviparous- the large eggs hatch and develop outside of the body
25.
Argyrosomus regius
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Argyrosomus regius is a fish of the family Sciaenidae. It has a form to a European seabass, with a pearly-silver coloration. Length can range from 40–50 cm to 2 m long, with weights up to 55 kg, Argyrosomus regius has a relatively large head with quite small eyes, the large mouth is at the terminal position and an elongated body. The lateral line is seen and extends all the way to the caudal fin. The rear dorsal fin is longer than first one which has nine rays. The first ray of the fin is short and spiny while the second is very thin. Body colour pearly-silver, with bronze traits dorsally, the fin bases are reddish brown and mouth cavity yellow-gold or salmon pink. The scales are large and every fourth scale is set at a different angle from the rest and it can grow to 2m in length and 50 kg in weight. Argyrosomus regius is found in the eastern Atlantic from Norway to West Africa, including the Mediterranean Sea and it has colonised the Red Sea by migrating through the Suez Canal. In Europe it is rare off the British Isles and Scandinavia, Argyrosomus regius is a demersal, oceanodromous fish which is found in inshore waters and on the continental shelf, it can occur close to the bottom as well as in surface and mid-waters. The adults prey on grey mullet and clupeids such as sardines which are pursued in open water. The adults gather in inshore waters to spawn during spring and summer, the juveniles and subadults prefer estuaries and coastal lagoons, and the health of recruitment into the adult population is possibly determined by the availability of these habitats. These fish are migratory, at all ages, migrating along shore or between offshore and inshore waters in response to temperature changes. A. regius feeds on fishes and swimming crustaceans and mostly occurs over sand, close to rocks, at 1–200 m max, large schools of A. regius occur around wrecked ships that were deliberately sunk to create new habitat for a number of commercially caught species of fish. Most of their growth happens during the months and feeding activity is significantly reduced when the water temperature drops below 13-15 °C. In the following Spring they return to their feeding areas from the middle of May. Water temperature is the most important factor that determines the trophic migration and reproduction of meagre, an adult female A. regius measuring 1. 2m in length produces about 800,000 eggs and spawning occurs when the water temperature is 17-22 °C. The juveniles eat small fish and crustaceans switching to pelagic fish
26.
Israel
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Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in the Middle East, on the southeastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea and the northern shore of the Red Sea. The country contains geographically diverse features within its small area. Israels economy and technology center is Tel Aviv, while its seat of government and proclaimed capital is Jerusalem, in 1947, the United Nations adopted a Partition Plan for Mandatory Palestine recommending the creation of independent Arab and Jewish states and an internationalized Jerusalem. The plan was accepted by the Jewish Agency for Palestine, next year, the Jewish Agency declared the establishment of a Jewish state in Eretz Israel, to be known as the State of Israel. Israel has since fought several wars with neighboring Arab states, in the course of which it has occupied territories including the West Bank, Golan Heights and it extended its laws to the Golan Heights and East Jerusalem, but not the West Bank. Israels occupation of the Palestinian territories is the worlds longest military occupation in modern times, efforts to resolve the Israeli–Palestinian conflict have not resulted in peace. However, peace treaties between Israel and both Egypt and Jordan have successfully been signed, the population of Israel, as defined by the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics, was estimated in 2017 to be 8,671,100 people. It is the worlds only Jewish-majority state, with 74. 8% being designated as Jewish, the countrys second largest group of citizens are Arabs, at 20. 8%. The great majority of Israeli Arabs are Sunni Muslims, including significant numbers of semi-settled Negev Bedouins, other minorities include Arameans, Armenians, Assyrians, Black Hebrew Israelites, Circassians, Maronites and Samaritans. Israel also hosts a significant population of foreign workers and asylum seekers from Africa and Asia, including illegal migrants from Sudan, Eritrea. In its Basic Laws, Israel defines itself as a Jewish, Israel is a representative democracy with a parliamentary system, proportional representation and universal suffrage. The prime minister is head of government and the Knesset is the legislature, Israel is a developed country and an OECD member, with the 35th-largest economy in the world by nominal gross domestic product as of 2016. The country benefits from a skilled workforce and is among the most educated countries in the world with one of the highest percentage of its citizens holding a tertiary education degree. The country has the highest standard of living in the Middle East and the third highest in Asia, in the early weeks of independence, the government chose the term Israeli to denote a citizen of Israel, with the formal announcement made by Minister of Foreign Affairs Moshe Sharett. The names Land of Israel and Children of Israel have historically used to refer to the biblical Kingdom of Israel. The name Israel in these phrases refers to the patriarch Jacob who, jacobs twelve sons became the ancestors of the Israelites, also known as the Twelve Tribes of Israel or Children of Israel. The earliest known artifact to mention the word Israel as a collective is the Merneptah Stele of ancient Egypt. The area is known as the Holy Land, being holy for all Abrahamic religions including Judaism, Christianity, Islam
27.
Narrow-barred Spanish mackerel
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They are vivid blue to dark grey in colour along their backs and flanks and fade to a silvery blue-grey on the belly. Spanish mackerel have scores of narrow, vertical lines down their sides, Spanish mackerel are the largest of all Australian mackerels, growing to about 200 cm and up to 70 kg. They are common down both sides of Australia as far south as Perth on the west coast and Sydney on the east coast and they are also found as far north as China and even Japan. Spanish mackerel spawn in oceanic conditions on reef edges and this is not always the case with adult mackerel, where occasional mixing of different species within the same genus can occur. Spawning is seasonal, but it is protracted in the waters of the tropics. Many of the fisheries that target this species are based on prespawning feeding aggregations, a significant proportion of the female fish caught in NT waters between July and December have either recently spawned or are close to spawning. In general, spawning times for Spanish mackerel tend to be associated with water temperatures that promote optimal food availability for the rapid growth. As the young grow, they move from the offshore spawning grounds to inshore and estuarine habitats. In the inshore environments, they feed mostly on the larvae and juveniles of small fish and crustaceans until they become large enough to eat small fish, Australian studies of this species suggest females are larger than males. Female Spanish mackerel mature at two years of age or around 80 cm in length. Spanish mackerel are voracious, opportunistic carnivores, as with other members of the genus, food consists mainly of small fishes with lesser quantities of shrimp and squid. Spanish mackerel are highly valued fish throughout their range in the Indo West Pacific, recreational anglers catch them from boats while trolling or drifting and from boats, piers, jetties, and beaches by casting spoons and jigs, and live-bait fishing. Commercial methods are primarily run-around gill netting, and rarely, by trolling lures similar to those used by recreational anglers, as most fish, the narrow-barred Spanish mackerel is infected by a variety of parasites. Spectacular parasites are the cysts of the larvae of the trypanorhynch cestode Callitetrarhynchus gracilis and these parasites are not appetizing, but represent no danger to humans
28.
Ecological niche
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In ecology, a niche is a term with a variety of meanings related to the behavior of a species living under specific environmental conditions. The ecological niche describes how an organism or population responds to the distribution of resources and competitors, the notion of ecological niche is central to ecological biogeography, which focuses on spatial patterns of ecological communities. Species distributions and their dynamics over time result from properties of the species, and interactions between the two — in particular the abilities of some species, especially our own, to modify their environments and alter the range dynamics of many other species. Alteration of a niche by its inhabitants is the topic of niche construction. Island biogeography can help explain island species and associated unfilled niches, the ecological meaning of niche comes from the meaning of niche as a recess in a wall for a statue, which itself is probably derived from the Middle French word nicher, meaning to nest. The Grinnellian niche concept embodies the idea that the niche of a species is determined by the habitat in which it lives, in other words, the niche is the sum of the habitat requirements and behaviors that allow a species to persist and produce offspring. Its niche is defined by the felicitous complementing of the thrashers behavior and this perspective of niche allows for the existence of both ecological equivalents and empty niches. In 1927 Charles Sutherland Elton, a British ecologist, defined a niche as follows, The niche of an animal means its place in the environment, its relations to food. Elton classified niches according to foraging activities, For instance there is the niche that is filled by birds of prey which eat small animals such as shrews, in an oak wood this niche is filled by tawny owls, while in the open grassland it is occupied by kestrels. Conceptually, the Eltonian niche introduces the idea of a response to. In an extreme example, beavers require certain resources in order to survive and reproduce, thus, the beaver affects the biotic and abiotic conditions of other species that live in and near the watershed. In a more subtle case, competitors that consume resources at different rates can lead to cycles in resource density that differ between species, not only do species grow differently with respect to resource density, their own population growth can lead to different effects on resource density over time. The hypervolume defines the space of resources available to organisms. The niche concept was popularized by the zoologist G. Evelyn Hutchinson in 1957, Hutchinson inquired into the question of why there are so many types of organisms in any one habitat. For such a distribution, the position, width and form of the niche correspond to the mean, standard deviation. This postulate, however, can be misguided, as it ignores the impacts that the resources of each category have on the organism, for instance, the resource in the overlap region can be non-limiting, in which case there is no competition for this resource despite niche overlap. An organism free of interference from other species could use the range of conditions and resources in which it could survive. Hutchinson used the idea of competition for resources as the mechanism driving ecology
29.
Prawn
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Prawn is a common name for small aquatic crustaceans with an exoskeleton and ten legs, some of which can be eaten. Shrimp that fall in this category often belong to the suborder Dendrobranchiata, in North America, the term is used less frequently, typically for freshwater shrimp. The terms shrimp and prawn themselves lack scientific standing, over the years, the way shrimp and prawn are used has changed, and nowadays the terms are almost interchangeable. In the United Kingdom, prawn is more common on menus than shrimp, the term prawn also loosely describes any large shrimp, especially those at 15 to the pound. The terms shrimp and prawn are common names, not scientific names and they are vernacular or colloquial terms which lack the formal definition of scientific terms. They are not taxa, but are terms of convenience with little circumscriptional significance, there is no reason to avoid using the terms shrimp or prawn when convenient, but it is important not to confuse them with the names or relationships of actual taxa. According to the crustacean taxonomist Tin-Yam Chan, The terms shrimp, a lot of confusion surrounds the scope of the term shrimp. Part of the confusion originates with the association of smallness and that creates problems with shrimp-like species that are not small. The expression jumbo shrimp can be viewed as an oxymoron, a problem that doesnt exist with the commercial designation jumbo prawns. It is not clear where the term originated, but early forms of the word surfaced in England in the early 15th century as prayne, praine and prane. According to the linguist Anatoly Liberman it is unclear how shrimp, in English, no Germanic language associates the shrimp with its size. It remains unclear in what circumstances the name was applied to the crustacean, taxonomic studies in Europe on shrimp and prawns were shaped by the common shrimp and the common prawn, both found in huge numbers along the European coastlines. The common shrimp, Crangon crangon was categorised in 1758 by Carl Linnaeus, the common shrimp is a small burrowing species aligned with the notion of a shrimp as being something small, whereas the common prawn is much larger. The terms true shrimp or true prawn are used to mean what a particular person thinks is a shrimp or prawn. This varies with the using the terms. But such terms are not normally used in the literature, because the terms shrimp. Over the years the way shrimp and prawn are used has changed, although from time to time some biologists declare that certain common names should be confined to specific taxa, the popular use of these names seems to continue unchanged. The terms shrimp and prawn originated in Great Britain, in the use of common names for species, shrimp is applied to smaller species, particularly species that are dorsoventrally depressed with a shorter rostrum
30.
Erythraean Sea
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The Erythraean Sea is the name in ancient cartography for a body of water located between the Horn of Africa and the Arabian peninsula. This appellation may have derived from the blooms of the red-coloured Trichodesmium erythraeum near the waters surface. In centuries past, the name Erythraean Sea was applied by cartographers to the NW part of the Indian Ocean, mainly the area around Socotra and this appellation has now become obsolete and the name Gulf of Aden is used, although for a smaller area. In maps where the NW Indian Ocean is named thus, the Red Sea appears as Arabian Gulf, the name Erythraean Sea was used as well to refer to some gulfs attached to the Indian Ocean, specifically, the Persian Gulf. As a name for the Red Sea, especially after the 19th century, the modern country of Eritrea was named after this ancient Greek name. Since 1895, the name has also applied to a large dusky region on the surface of planet Mars
31.
Levant
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The Levant is an approximate historical geographical term referring to a large area in the Eastern Mediterranean. The term Levant entered English in the late 15th century from French and it derives from the Italian Levante, meaning rising, implying the rising of the sun in the east. As such, it is equivalent to the Arabic term Mashriq. Eventually the term was restricted to the Muslim countries of Syria-Palestine, in 1581, England set up the Levant Company to monopolize commerce with the Ottoman Empire. The name Levant States was used to refer to the French mandate over Syria and this is probably the reason why the term Levant has come to be used synonymously with Syria-Palestine. Some scholars misunderstood the term thinking that it derives from the name of Lebanon, today the term is typically used in conjunction with prehistoric or ancient historical references. It does not include Anatolia, the Caucasus Mountains, or any part of the Arabian Peninsula proper, the Sinai Peninsula is sometimes included. The Levant has been described as the crossroads of western Asia, the eastern Mediterranean, and northeast Africa, the populations of the Levant share not only the geographic position, but cuisine, some customs, and a very long history. They are often referred to as Levantines, the term Levant, which appeared in English in 1497, originally meant the East in general or Mediterranean lands east of Italy. It is borrowed from the French levant rising, referring to the rising of the sun in the east, the phrase is ultimately from the Latin word levare, meaning lift, raise. Similar etymologies are found in Greek Ἀνατολή, in Germanic Morgenland, in Italian, in Hungarian Kelet, in Spanish and Catalan Levante and Llevant, most notably, Orient and its Latin source oriens meaning east, is literally rising, deriving from Latin orior rise. The notion of the Levant has undergone a process of historical evolution in usage, meaning. While the term Levantine originally referred to the European residents of the eastern Mediterranean region, it came to refer to regional native. The English Levant Company was founded in 1581 to trade with the Ottoman Empire, at this time, the Far East was known as the Upper Levant. In early 19th-century travel writing, the term sometimes incorporated certain Mediterranean provinces of the Ottoman empire, in 19th-century archaeology, it referred to overlapping cultures in this region during and after prehistoric times, intending to reference the place instead of any one culture. The French mandate of Syria and Lebanon was called the Levant states, today, Levant is the term typically used by archaeologists and historians with reference to the history of the region. Scholars have adopted the term Levant to identify the region due to it being a wider, yet relevant, archaeologists seeking a neutral orientation that is neither biblical nor national have used terms such as Levantine archaeology and archaeology of the Southern Levant. Two academic journals were launched, Journal of Levantine Studies, published by the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute and The Levantine Review
32.
Copepod
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Copepods are a group of small crustaceans found in the sea and nearly every freshwater habitat. Many live underground in marine and freshwater caves, sinkholes, or stream beds, copepods are sometimes used as biodiversity indicators. As with other crustaceans, copepods have a larval form, for copepods, the egg hatches into a nauplius form, with a head and a tail but no true thorax or abdomen. The larva molts several times until it resembles the adult and then, after more molts, the nauplius form is so different from the adult form that it was once thought to be a separate species. Copepods form a subclass belonging to the subphylum Crustacea, they are divided into ten orders, some 13,000 species of copepods are known, and 2,800 of them live in fresh water. Copepods vary considerably, but can typically be 1 to 2 mm long, with a teardrop-shaped body, like other crustaceans, they have an armoured exoskeleton but they are so small that in most species this thin armour and the entire body, is almost totally transparent. Some polar copepods reach 1 cm, most copepods have a single median compound eye, usually bright red and in the centre of the transparent head, subterranean species may be eyeless. Like other crustaceans copepods possess two pairs of antennae, the first pair is long and conspicuous. Copepods typically have a short, cylindrical body, with a rounded or beaked head, the head is fused with the first one or two thoracic segments, while the remainder of the thorax has three to five segments, each with limbs. The first pair of appendages is modified to form maxillipeds. The abdomen is narrower than the thorax, and contains five segments without any appendages. Because of their size, copepods have no need of any heart or circulatory system. Instead, they absorb oxygen directly into their bodies and their excretory system consists of maxillary glands. The second pair of appendages in free-living copepods is usually the main time-averaged source of propulsion. Many species have neurons surrounded by myelin, which is rare among invertebrates. Even rarer, the myelin is highly organized, resembling the well-organized wrapping found in vertebrates, finding a mate in the three-dimensional space of open water is challenging. Some copepod females solve the problem by emitting pheromones, which leave a trail in the water that the male can follow, copepods feed directly on phytoplankton, catching cells singly. Some of the species are predators of their smaller relatives
33.
Spinner shark
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The spinner shark is a species of requiem shark, in the family Carcharhinidae, named for the spinning leaps it makes as a part of its feeding strategy. This species occurs in tropical and warm temperate waters worldwide, except for in the eastern Pacific Ocean and it is found from coastal to offshore habitats to a depth of 100 m, though it prefers shallow water. The spinner shark resembles a version of the blacktip shark, with a slender body, long snout. This species can be distinguished from the shark by the first dorsal fin, which has a different shape and is placed further back. It attains a length of 3 m. Spinner sharks are swift and gregarious predators that feed on a variety of small bony fishes. When feeding on schools of fish, they will speed vertically through the school while spinning on their axis. Like other members of its family, the shark is viviparous. The newborns are born in shallow areas near the coast. This species is not usually dangerous to humans, but may become belligerent when excited by food, spinner sharks are valued by commercial fisheries across their range for their meat, fins, liver oil, and skin. They are also esteemed as strong fighters by recreational fishers, the IUCN has assessed this species as Near Threatened worldwide and Vulnerable off the southeastern United States. This species was moved to the genera Aprion, Squalus. The tooth shape and coloration of this varies significantly with age. Other common names include blacktipped shark, great blacktip shark, inkytail shark, large blacktip shark, long-nose grey shark, longnose grey whaler, and smoothfang shark. Based on similarities in morphology, tooth shape, and behavior, the closest relatives of the spinner shark were originally believed to be the blacktip shark, some uncertainty exists in the distribution data for the spinner shark due to confusion with the blacktip shark. In the western Atlantic Ocean, it occurs from North Carolina to the northern Gulf of Mexico, including the Bahamas and Cuba, in the eastern Atlantic, it occurs from off North Africa to Namibia. In the Indian Ocean, it is found from South Africa and Madagascar, to the Red Sea, in the Pacific Ocean, it occurs off Japan, Vietnam, Australia, and possibly the Philippines. Parasitological evidence suggests that Indian Ocean spinner sharks have passed through the Suez Canal into the Mediterranean Sea, becoming Lessepsian migrants
34.
Tunisia
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Tunisia, officially the Republic of Tunisia is the northernmost country in Africa, covering 165,000 square kilometres. Its northernmost point, Cape Angela, is the northernmost point on the African continent and it is bordered by Algeria to the west and southwest, Libya to the southeast, and the Mediterranean Sea to the north and east. Tunisias population was estimated to be just under 11 million in 2014, Tunisias name is derived from its capital city, Tunis, which is located on Tunisias northeast coast. Geographically, Tunisia contains the end of the Atlas Mountains. Much of the rest of the land is fertile soil. Tunisia is a unitary semi-presidential representative democratic republic and it is considered to be the only full democracy in the Arab World. It has a human development index. In addition, Tunisia is also a state of the United Nations. Close relations with Europe – in particular with France and with Italy – have been forged through economic cooperation, privatisation, in ancient times, Tunisia was primarily inhabited by Berbers. Phoenician immigration began in the 12th century BC, these immigrants founded Carthage, a major mercantile power and a military rival of the Roman Republic, Carthage was defeated by the Romans in 146 BC. The Romans, who would occupy Tunisia for most of the eight hundred years, introduced Christianity. After several attempts starting in 647, the Arabs conquered the whole of Tunisia by 697, the Ottomans held sway for over three hundred years. The French colonization of Tunisia occurred in 1881, Tunisia gained independence with Habib Bourguiba and declared the Tunisian Republic in 1957. In 2011, the Tunisian Revolution resulted in the overthrow of President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, the country voted for parliament again on 26 October 2014, and for President on 23 November 2014. The word Tunisia is derived from Tunis, an urban hub. The present form of the name, with its Latinate suffix -ia, the French derivative Tunisie was adopted in some European languages with slight modifications, introducing a distinctive name to designate the country. Other languages remained untouched, such as the Russian Туни́с and Spanish Túnez, in this case, the same name is used for both country and city, as with the Arabic تونس, and only by context can one tell the difference. The name Tunis can be attributed to different origins and it is generally associated with the Berber root ⵜⵏⵙ, transcribed tns, which means to lay down or encampment
35.
Madagascar
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Madagascar, officially the Republic of Madagascar, and previously known as the Malagasy Republic, is an island country in the Indian Ocean, off the coast of Southeast Africa. The nation comprises the island of Madagascar, and numerous smaller peripheral islands, consequently, Madagascar is a biodiversity hotspot, over 90% of its wildlife is found nowhere else on Earth. The islands diverse ecosystems and unique wildlife are threatened by the encroachment of the growing human population. The first archaeological evidence for human foraging on Madagascar dates to 2000 BC, human settlement of Madagascar occurred between 350 BC and AD550 by Austronesian peoples arriving on outrigger canoes from Borneo. These were joined around AD1000 by Bantu migrants crossing the Mozambique Channel from East Africa, other groups continued to settle on Madagascar over time, each one making lasting contributions to Malagasy cultural life. The Malagasy ethnic group is divided into 18 or more sub-groups of which the largest are the Merina of the central highlands. Until the late 18th century, the island of Madagascar was ruled by an assortment of shifting sociopolitical alliances. Beginning in the early 19th century, most of the island was united and ruled as the Kingdom of Madagascar by a series of Merina nobles, the monarchy collapsed in 1897 when the island was absorbed into the French colonial empire, from which the island gained independence in 1960. The autonomous state of Madagascar has since undergone four major constitutional periods, since 1992, the nation has officially been governed as a constitutional democracy from its capital at Antananarivo. However, in an uprising in 2009, president Marc Ravalomanana was made to resign. Constitutional governance was restored in January 2014, when Hery Rajaonarimampianina was named president following a 2013 election deemed fair, Madagascar is a member of the United Nations, the Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie and the Southern African Development Community. Madagascar belongs to the group of least developed countries, according to the United Nations, Malagasy and French are both official languages of the state. The majority of the population adheres to traditional beliefs, Christianity, ecotourism and agriculture, paired with greater investments in education, health, and private enterprise, are key elements of Madagascars development strategy. As of 2017, the economy has been weakened by the 2009-2013 political crisis, in the Malagasy language, the island of Madagascar is called Madagasikara and its people are referred to as Malagasy. The islands appellation Madagascar is not of origin, but rather was popularized in the Middle Ages by Europeans. On St. Laurences Day in 1500, Portuguese explorer Diogo Dias landed on the island, polos name was preferred and popularized on Renaissance maps. At 592,800 square kilometres, Madagascar is the worlds 47th largest country, the country lies mostly between latitudes 12°S and 26°S, and longitudes 43°E and 51°E. Neighboring islands include the French territory of Réunion and the country of Mauritius to the east, as well as the state of Comoros, the nearest mainland state is Mozambique, located to the west
36.
Host (biology)
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In biology, a host is an organism that harbors a parasitic, a mutual, or a commensal symbiont, typically providing nourishment and shelter. Examples include animals playing host to parasitic worms, cells harbouring a parasitic virus, more specifically in botany, a host plant supplies food resources and acts as a substrate for commensalist insects or other fauna. Guest is the term used for parasites, mutualists and commensals. The host range of a parasite is the collection of hosts that an organism can utilize as a partner, in the case of human parasites, the host range influences the epidemiology of the parasitism or disease. For instance, the production of antigenic shifts in Influenza A virus can result from pigs being infected with the virus from different hosts. This co-infection provides an opportunity for mixing of the viral genes between existing strains, thereby producing a new viral strain
37.
Flathead grey mullet
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The flathead grey mullet is an important food fish species in the mullet family Mugilidae. It is found in tropical and subtropical waters worldwide. Its length is typically 30 to 75 centimetres and it is known with numerous English names, including the flathead mullet, striped mullet, black mullet, bully mullet, common mullet, grey mullet, sea mullet and mullet, among others. The flathead grey mullet is a mainly coastal species that often enters estuaries. It usually schools over sand or mud bottoms, feeding on zooplankton, the adult fish normally feed on algae in fresh water. The species is euryhaline, meaning that the fish can acclimate to different levels of salinity, the back of the fish is olive-green, sides are silvery and shade to white towards the belly. The fish may have six to seven distinctive lateral horizontal stripes, the mullet has no lateral line. A common length is about 50 centimetres, and its length is 100 centimetres. It can reach a weight of eight kilograms. The flathead mullet is cosmopolitan in coastal waters of the tropical, subtropical and it occupies fresh, brackish and marine habitats in depths ranging between 0–120 metres and with temperatures between 8–24 °C. In freshwaters of the western United States, the striped mullet historically ranged far up the Colorado River to the vicinity of Blythe and they are often abundant in the mainstream and lateral canals in the Gila River region. In the Colorado River mullet are pelagic in larger pools, sometimes moving into currents below dams, the mullet populations are currently declining in Arizona, due to periods when the Colorado River does not reach the Gulf of California. The flathead grey mullet is an important food fish around the world, the reported worldwide catches from fishing in 2012 were about 130,000 tonnes and aquaculture production was 142,000 tonnes. In Egypt, the fish itself is salted, dried, on the coast of Northwest Florida and Alabama, this mullet, called the striped or black mullet, is often a specialty of seafood restaurants. Fried mullet is most popular, but smoked, baked, local fishermen usually catch mullet in a castnet, though some use a hook. Mullet is a delicacy in this area and is most often consumed in the home, mullet are usually filleted, and the remaining frames used for fish stock, used in chowders and stews. The mullet most commonly consumed in Florida however is the white mullet, because its preference for cleaner water gives it a cleaner and less muddy taste
38.
Golden grey mullet
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The golden grey mullet is a fish in the family Mugilidae. It has hydrodynamic, very elegant elongated, more or less cylindrical body and it has dark gray back that transit into silver white toward the belly with several grey horizontal stripes. Golden spot is present in gill covers and its maximum length is around 60 cm and weight around 1.5 kg, but commonly it is much smaller fish with average specimen having 30 cm in length. Reproduction takes place in the sea, from July to November and it is present in Eastern Atlantic from Scotland to Cape Verde, in the Mediterranean and Black Sea and in coastal waters from southern Norway and Sweden to Morocco. It is rare off coasts of Mauritania and it has been introduced into the Azov and Caspian Seas. Golden grey mullet is a species, usually inshore, entering lagoons, ports and estuaries. It feeds on benthic organisms, detritus and occasionally insects. It ranges from shallows to depths of about 20m, but it is most common between 1 - 10m, in many countries there is a minimum allowed fish length for golden grey mullet of 20 cm. In some estuaries it is main target of commercial fishery and recreational fishermen. Commercially it is using special nets for mullets that allows catching specimen that jump over first net line. Meat is white, soft and very tender, golden grey mullet can be pan fried, especially smaller fish. Barbequed with some oil, lemon juice and parsley is often considered a delicacy. Also, it can be used as part of mixed fish stew
39.
Thicklip grey mullet
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The thicklip grey mullet, Chelon labrosus, is a coastal fish of the family Mugilidae. It typically is about 32 cm long, with 75 cm being the maximum recorded and it is named after its thick upper lip and silvery-grey appearance. It is a fish of shallow, sheltered coasts, estuaries. It lives in the northeastern Atlantic Ocean from Iceland to Senegal and Cape Verde, including the Mediterranean Sea and this species is partially migratory, heading northwards in summer. It feeds mainly on diatoms, epiphytic algae, small invertebrates. The thicklip grey mullet lays its eggs in winter, both eggs and fry are pelagic. The thicklip grey mullet is valued both as a fish and as a tenacious game fish
40.
Biomass
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Biomass is an industry term for getting energy by burning wood, and other organic matter. It has become popular among power stations, which switch from coal to biomass to comply with the law. Biomass most often refers to plants or plant-based materials that are not used for food or feed, as an energy source, biomass can either be used directly via combustion to produce heat, or indirectly after converting it to various forms of biofuel. Conversion of biomass to biofuel can be achieved by different methods which are classified into, thermal, chemical. Historically, humans have harnessed biomass-derived energy since the time people began burning wood to make fire. Even today, biomass is the source of fuel for domestic use in many developing countries. Biomass is all biologically-produced matter based in carbon, hydrogen and oxygen, the estimated biomass production in the world is 104.9 petagrams of carbon per year, about half in the ocean and half on land. Wood remains the largest biomass energy source today, examples include forest residues, yard clippings, wood chips, wood energy is derived by using lignocellulosic biomass as fuel. Harvested wood may be used directly as a fuel or collected from waste streams to be processed into pellet fuel or other forms of fuels. The largest source of energy from wood is pulping liquor or black liquor, in the second sense, biomass includes plant or animal matter that can be converted into fibers or other industrial chemicals, including biofuels. Based on the source of biomass, biofuels are classified broadly into two major categories, first-generation biofuels are derived from sources such as sugarcane and corn starch. Sugars present in this biomass are fermented to produce bioethanol, a fuel which can be used directly in a fuel cell to produce electricity or serve as an additive to gasoline. However, utilizing food-based resources for production only aggravates the food shortage problem. Second-generation biofuels, on the hand, utilize non-food-based biomass sources such as agriculture. These biofuels mostly consist of lignocellulosic biomass, which is not edible and is a waste for many industries. Despite being the alternative, economical production of second-generation biofuel is not yet achieved due to technological issues. These issues arise due to chemical inertness and structural rigidity of lignocellulosic biomass. Plant energy is produced by crops grown for use as fuel that offer high biomass output per hectare with low input energy
41.
Barnacle
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A barnacle is a type of arthropod constituting the infraclass Cirripedia in the subphylum Crustacea, and is hence related to crabs and lobsters. Barnacles are exclusively marine, and tend to live in shallow and tidal waters and they are sessile suspension feeders, and have two nektonic larval stages. Around 1,220 barnacle species are currently known, the name Cirripedia is Latin, meaning curl-footed. Barnacles are encrusters, attaching themselves permanently to a hard substrate, the most common, acorn barnacles, are sessile, growing their shells directly onto the substrate. The order Pedunculata attach themselves by means of a stalk, free-living barnacles are attached to the substratum by cement glands that form the base of the first pair of antennae, in effect, the animal is fixed upside down by means of its forehead. In some barnacles, the cement glands are fixed to a long, muscular stalk, a ring of plates surrounds the body, homologous with the carapace of other crustaceans. These consist of the rostrum, two plates, two carinolaterals, and a carina. In sessile barnacles, the apex of the ring of plates is covered by an operculum, the plates are held together by various means, depending on species, in some cases being solidly fused. Inside the carapace, the lies on its back, with its limbs projecting upwards. Segmentation is usually indistinct, and the body is more or less divided between the head and thorax, with little, if any, abdomen. Adult barnacles have few appendages on their heads, with only a single, vestigial pair of antennae, attached to the cement gland. The six pairs of limbs are referred to as cirri. Barnacles have no heart, although a sinus close to the esophagus performs similar function. The blood vascular system is minimal, similarly, they have no gills, absorbing oxygen from the water through their limbs and the inner membrane of their carapaces. The excretory organs of barnacles are maxillary glands, the main sense of barnacles appears to be touch, with the hairs on the limbs being especially sensitive. The adult also has an eye, although this is probably only capable of sensing the difference between light and dark. This eye is derived from the naupliar eye. Barnacles have two larval stages, the nauplius and the cyprid, before developing into a mature adult
42.
Neutering
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Neutering, from the Latin neuter, is the removal of an animals reproductive organ, either all of it or a considerably large part. Neutering is often used incorrectly to refer only to male animals, the male-specific term is castration, while spaying is usually reserved for female animals. Colloquially, both terms are referred to as fixing. In male horses, castrating is referred to as gelding, modern veterinary practice tends to use the term de-sexing. Neutering is the most common method for the sterilization of animals, many states require that all adopted cats and dogs be sterilized before going to their new homes. After Barkers retirement, Drew Carey continued to sign off with his own message regarding spaying and neutering, in female animals, spaying involves abdominal surgery to remove the ovaries and uterus. Traditional spaying is performed commonly on household pets, as a method of birth control and it is performed less commonly on livestock, as a method of birth control or for other reasons. In mares, these reasons include behavior modification. The surgery can be performed using an open approach or by laparoscopic keyhole surgery. Open surgery is widely available as laparoscopic surgical equipment costs are expensive. Traditional open surgery is performed through a ventral midline incision below the umbilicus. The incision size varies depending upon the surgeon and the size of the animal, the uterine horns are identified and the ovaries are found by following the horns to their ends. There is a ligament that attaches the ovaries to the body wall, the ovarian arteries are then ligated with resorbable suture material and then the arteries transected. The uterine body and related arteries are also tied off just in front of the cervix, the entire uterus and ovaries are then removed. The abdomen is checked for bleeding and then closed with a three-layer closure, the linea alba and then the subcutaneous layer are closed with resorbable suture material. The skin is then stapled, sutured, or glued closed, laparoscopic surgery is performed using a camera and instruments placed through small incisions in the body wall. The patient is under anaesthesia and lying on the back, the incisions are between 5 and 10 millimetres and the number varies according to the equipment and technique used. The surgeon watches on a screen during the operation, the first port is made just behind the umbilicus and the camera is inserted
43.
Turkey
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Turkey, officially the Republic of Turkey, is a transcontinental country in Eurasia, mainly in Anatolia in Western Asia, with a smaller portion on the Balkan peninsula in Southeast Europe. Turkey is a democratic, secular, unitary, parliamentary republic with a cultural heritage. The country is encircled by seas on three sides, the Aegean Sea is to the west, the Black Sea to the north, and the Mediterranean Sea to the south. The Bosphorus, the Sea of Marmara, and the Dardanelles, Ankara is the capital while Istanbul is the countrys largest city and main cultural and commercial centre. Approximately 70-80% of the countrys citizens identify themselves as ethnic Turks, other ethnic groups include legally recognised and unrecognised minorities. Kurds are the largest ethnic minority group, making up approximately 20% of the population, the area of Turkey has been inhabited since the Paleolithic by various ancient Anatolian civilisations, as well as Assyrians, Greeks, Thracians, Phrygians, Urartians and Armenians. After Alexander the Greats conquest, the area was Hellenized, a process continued under the Roman Empire. The Seljuk Sultanate of Rûm ruled Anatolia until the Mongol invasion in 1243, the empire reached the peak of its power in the 16th century, especially during the reign of Suleiman the Magnificent. During the war, the Ottoman government committed genocides against its Armenian, Assyrian, following the war, the conglomeration of territories and peoples that formerly comprised the Ottoman Empire was partitioned into several new states. Turkey is a member of the UN, an early member of NATO. Turkeys growing economy and diplomatic initiatives have led to its recognition as a regional power while her location has given it geopolitical, the name of Turkey is based on the ethnonym Türk. The first recorded use of the term Türk or Türük as an autonym is contained in the Old Turkic inscriptions of the Göktürks of Central Asia, the English name Turkey first appeared in the late 14th century and is derived from Medieval Latin Turchia. Similarly, the medieval Khazar Empire, a Turkic state on the shores of the Black. The medieval Arabs referred to the Mamluk Sultanate as al-Dawla al-Turkiyya, the Ottoman Empire was sometimes referred to as Turkey or the Turkish Empire among its European contemporaries. The Anatolian peninsula, comprising most of modern Turkey, is one of the oldest permanently settled regions in the world, various ancient Anatolian populations have lived in Anatolia, from at least the Neolithic period until the Hellenistic period. Many of these peoples spoke the Anatolian languages, a branch of the larger Indo-European language family, in fact, given the antiquity of the Indo-European Hittite and Luwian languages, some scholars have proposed Anatolia as the hypothetical centre from which the Indo-European languages radiated. The European part of Turkey, called Eastern Thrace, has also been inhabited since at least forty years ago. It is the largest and best-preserved Neolithic site found to date, the settlement of Troy started in the Neolithic Age and continued into the Iron Age
