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http://www.dtmag.com/Stories/Ocean Ecology/06-02-2feature.htm
Feature
Alex Brylske
6/16/2015 9:20 PM
AFRICA'S REVENGE:
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colleagues was increased water temperature due to global warming. But the global warming theory
didnt seem to hold water (sorry for the pun) in all cases, or at least, it wasnt the whole story. There
must be another contributor, Shinn thought.
A major piece of the puzzle fell into place when Shinn learned of the work being done by Joe Prospero.
Beginning in 1965, Prospero measured African dust levels on the island of Barbados, which started
showing dramatic increases around 1970 (See figure 1). Noting, particularly, the peaks occurring in
1983 and 1987, Shinn began to see a pattern. He knew that episodes of coral bleaching began
proliferating in Florida and the Caribbean in the late 1980s and 1990s, with a major event occurring in
the summer of 1987. Furthermore, in 1983 the black spiny sea urchin (Diadema antillarum) was almost
eradicated from the Caribbean by what scientists have attributed to a still-unidentified disease.
A One-Two Punch
While a correlation seems to exist between dust storms and perturbing events on Caribbean coral reefs,
this doesnt answer the question of how dust might be the cause of the reefs woes. As it turns out, the
cause appears to come from two different mechanisms. The first you might be familiar with if you take
multivitamins. Women, in particular, are often advised to take vitamins containing the micronutrient
iron. While plants dont need iron for the same reasons as humans, its nonetheless an important
nutrient to them as well. Scientific experiments have, in fact, documented that enriching the ocean with
iron can result in enormous plankton blooms, demonstrating that low levels of iron may be a limiting
factor in ocean productivity. And guess whats in African dust? You got it; along with other nutrients
such as phosphate, it contains lots of iron.
The working hypothesis is that dust may act as a fertilizer on coral reefs, allowing fleshy algae to grow
much faster than normal. This, combined with the demise of herbivorous reef fish populations due to
overfishing, results in the overgrowth of algae, eventually leading to what scientists call a phase shift
from a coral reef to an algal reef. But the problems caused by the dust isnt just the ability to act as
some superfertilizer; there are also organisms within the dust that can cause disease.
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Disease is also at the center of another intriguing indication that African dust could be wreaking further
environmental havoc. Several years ago divers in Florida began noticing a curious infestation plaguing
sea fans. Tiny lesions began growing like cancer, consuming their host, and leaving behind algalcovered skeletons of what once were healthy sea fans. Once rare, this disease is now quite common
and has decimated sea fan populations, particularly along the southeast Florida coast. (Most recently,
the disease has also been documented in sea whips.) Then, a shocking breakthrough. Garriet Smith, a
researcher at the University of South Carolina, identified the cause of sea fan disease as a soil fungus,
Aspergillus. The puzzling thing was that Aspergillus cannot reproduce in seawater, which meant there
had to be a continuing source of spores to explain the ongoing nature of the disease. Later, Smith and
his colleagues isolated from the dust samples a particular species of fungus, Aspergillus sydowii, which
they used to inoculate healthy sea fans. The result: Fifty percent of the infected sea fans showed signs
of the disease. As Gene Shinn said, So far, thats the best smoking gun we have for proof that
microbes transported in the dust are having a detrimental ecological effect.
Another frightening aspect of the Aspergillus discovery is that the fungus isnt just a problem for sea
fans; its also a source of significant infection in humans. In fact, it accounts for a high portion of
infection-related deaths in hospitals, is a leading cause of death due to lung infection among AIDS
patients, and has even been linked to severe illness in healthy individuals. This finding initially led to
suspicions that Aspergillus was being introduced to the marine environment by the dumping of
biohazardous materials at sea. But the African dust proponents have provided a compelling and much
more plausible theory.
While scientists have known for a long time about the wide-ranging transport of dust in the upper-level
winds, a more recent discovery is that the African dust plumes carry with them a host of tiny,
hitchhiking microbes besides Aspergillus. These include both bacteria and viruses. The potential
worldwide implications for not only marine ecosystems, but also human health, are obvious.
Until recently, microbiologists assumed that during the five- to seven-day trip required for African
microbes to reach North America and the Caribbean, most would be killed by ultraviolet rays in the
upper atmosphere. But, like much of what science originally assumes, this isnt true. Cultures made
from African dust samples taken from the Virgin Islands have been analyzed and have been found to
contain almost 130 different kinds of bacteria and fungi. Most of the dust ends up in south Florida,
where it has spawned red-tinged sunsets for years. Again, said Dr. Dale Griffin, We typically isolate
about two colonies of fungi from clear air samples, whereas we might recover 20 to 40 isolates of fungi
and bacteria from samples taken during dust events.
Exactly how the microbes survive hasnt been fully explained, but Griffin thinks that several
mechanisms are possible. First, the plumes contain not only dust but also lots of smoke from slashand-burn agriculture. This might act to filter some of the ultraviolet light. Additionally, some of the dust
is transported in the lower atmosphere where microbes may not be subjected to ultraviolet radiation at
levels high enough to be lethal. And finally, the microbes may adhere to cracks, crevasses or other
shaded areas of dust particles. However they do it, they arrive alive.
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Human Factors
It would be a mistake to assume that the implications of the African dust phenomenon are limited to
coral reefs or even the ocean. In a clear and frightening example of how all residents of this planet
share a common fate, we humans have as much to be concerned with as any creature of the sea. The
evidence from the Caribbean for dust-born disease is very compelling. For example, levels of asthma on
the islands of Barbados and Trinidad are among the highest in the world. On these two islands alone,
the Caribbean Allergy and Respiratory Association (CARA) has documented a seventeenfold increase in
asthma since 1973. Coincidentally, that was also the first year in which Dr. Prospero saw a spike in his
data from the dust records on Barbados.
Floridians may also be affected. Since 1980, the number of Americans with asthma has increased 154
percent. The Tampa Bay region, near Jason Lenes study site on red tide, has one of the states highest
asthma rates, with 7.1 percent of students now reporting asthma symptoms, compared with 2.7
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percent just four years ago. According to Prosperos work, about half the particles breathed in South
Florida during summer months originate in Africa, says Gene Shinn. The asthma epidemic in areas
that are relatively free of industry correlates with the increased flux of African dust that has been
continuously monitored in Barbados since 1965.
But we should be careful about jumping to conclusions. Not a lot is known about wind-transported
disease, says Prospero. At this point, its a hypothesis that has some supporting evidence. But its a
complicated subject.
Like some heavenly judgment for the hundreds of years shes been plagued by slavery, colonialism and
countless forms of exploitation by the West, Africa may wreak its vengeance before the rest of the
world even realizes somethings wrong. What the future holds, no one knows. As the song says, the
answer is blowin in the wind.
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