Volume 45, Issue 3 (2016)
Cover and Front Matter
Articles
The importance of ants in cave ecology, with new records and behavioral observations of ants in Arizona caves
Robert B. Pape
- Ants are important elements in cave ecology.
- A global list of ant species recorded from caves is compiled from the literature.
- A summary of ant records and behavioral observations from caves in Arizona (USA) is presented.
- First record of Neivamyrmex preying on endemic cave arthropods.
- Observations of hypogeic ants suggest they do not forage at great depth in caves.
ATP luminescence assay as a bioburden estimator of biomass accumulation in caves
Janez Mulec and Andreea Oarga-Mulec
- Applicability of an ATP assay for estimation of bioburden in caves.
- A high variability of microbial biomass within a single cave system.
- Cave infrastructures containing heavy metals reduce the viability of microbiota.
- Underground habitats preserve and concentrate microbial biomass.
Tube coalescence in the Jingfudong lava tube and implications for lava flow hazard of Tengchong Volcanism
Zhengquan Chen, Yongshun Liu, Haiquan Wei, Jiandong Xu, and Wenfeng Guo
- An overall description of tub-fed features within Tengchong basic lava flows.
- Detailed investigation of the longest lava tube known ( Jingfudong lava tube) in Tengchong area.
- Lave tube coalescence phenomenon in Jingfudong lava tube.
- Interpretation the coalescence and bifurcation processes of tube system from the field evidences and models.
- Implications for vertical behaviors within lava flows.
High-resolution signatures of oxygenation and microbiological activity in speleothem fluid inclusions
Nigel Blamey, Penelope J. Boston, and Laura Rosales-Lagarde
- Speleothem inclusions contain gases that can reflect past chemical and biological processes.
- Inclusion gas contents can be analyzed to high precision with quadrupole mass spectroscopy.
- CFS (crush fast scan) methodology enables high resolution analysis (30mg) withlimits.
- Each preliminary result has several possible explanations not yet distinguishable.
- Further technique development can help unravel geo, bio, and climate influences on inclusion gases.
The morphology and development of Kalahroud Cave, Iran
Shirin Bahadorinia, Sayed Hassan Hejazi, Alireza Nadimi, Derek C. Ford, and Karine Wainer
- Sub-horizontal maze cave in a cuesta of dipping limestones.
- Drains along the strike to an a-periodic river gorge in arid mountains.
- Morphology and sediment analysis show hypogene origin, with paragenesis.
- Corrosion notch rooms contain precipitate sequences, ending with calcite rafts of Holocene age
Seasonal temperature variations controlling cave ventilation processes in Cueva Larga, Puerto Rico
Rolf Vieten, Amos Winter, Sophie Friederike Warken, Andrea Schrӧder-Ritzrau, Thomas E. Miller, and Denis Scholz
- Seasonal temperature variations control cave ventilation processes in a tropical cave.
- Cave air pCO2 in varies between 600 ppm in winter and 1800 ppm in summer.
- The cave air exchange time is estimated to be 36 ± 5 days.
- Minor pCO2 variations are related to atmospheric pressure changes.
- Cave morphology is a key parameter of ventilation processes.
Characterization of antimicrobial activity of culturable bacteria isolated from Krubera-Voronja Cave
Aiste Klusaite, Vida Vickackaite, Birute Vaitkeviciene, Rasa Karnickaite, Dominykas Bukelskis, Ieva Kieraite-Aleksandrova, and Nomeda Kuisiene
- The first analysis of antimicrobial activity of bacteria isolated from Krubera-Voronja Cave.
- The first report on chemical characterization of antimicrobial mixtures of Firmicutes isolated from caves.
Hybrid Taguchi-Objective Function optimization approach for automatic cave bird detection from terrestrial laser scanning intensity image
Mohammed O. Idrees and Biswajeet Pradhan
- Developed a hybrid optimization method to detect birds in cave.
- Combined Taguchi's and spatial objective function for cave bird detection.
- Proposed a new semi-automatic counting of birds in cave with greater efficiency.
Announcement
Iosif Viehmann - a lifetime dedicated to cave and karst
Bogdan P. Onac
