Readings: I. What is WATER ?
(Ice, Stratification, Incorporation)
It is unique. It has some peculiar qualities which we usually take for granted. That does not make them trivial. "Familiarity breeds contempt" [clichés exist because they summarize irritating truths]. You use about 1400 gal/day - experts say you really only need 700 gal/day. So, who cares if some of it gets contaminated --- there’s so much of it anyway........
1. First question: You should understand why ice floats, and why it is slippery. No formulas, no physics, no precise bond angle nos. - can you verbalize, "Why"?
Stillinger, F. 1980. Water revisited. Science 209:451-457.
Everything that goes on in a lake involves water. This paper, and the next several, should provide sufficient details to engender a bit of respect for plain, "ordinary" water. If these are easy reading, the Scientific American articles are unneeded (and your fellow-travelers are afraid of you!!) Invest decreasing amounts of time - in the first, the second, and the third - in that order, AND don't panic. See if you can sort out what role the tetramers, pentimers, hexamers, and those charming tinker-toy cubes, play in the structure of water and ice? You are NOT supposed to get it right, just puzzle over it for a while.
Benson, S. and E. Siebert. 1992. A new blueprint for water’s architecture. Science 256:1764.
Pribble, R. and T. Zwier. 1994. The structure of nature’s solvent: Water. Science 265:43.
Cruzan, J.; Braly, L.; Liu, K.; Brown, M.; Loeser, J., and R. Saykally. 1996. Quantifying hydrogen bond cooperativity in water: VRT spectroscopy of the water tetramer. Science 271:59-62.
Liu, K.; Brown, M.; Cruzan, R., and R. Saykally. 1996. Vibration-rotation tunneling spectra of the water pentamer: Structure and dynamics. Science 271:62-64.
The papers, above, are obviously more up-to-date, but those, below, may be of considerable help to you as you try to understand the more sophisticated (but inscrutable) papers, supra.
Hallett, J. 1996. FReeze frame. The Sciences 36(6):22-26.Saykally, R. and N. Pugliano. 1992. Mirror-image threesomes in water molecules. Science News 142:238.
Chalmers, B. 1959. How water freezes. Scientific American 200:114-122.
Wu, C. 1997. Ice’s watery surface comes into view. Science News 151:4.
Seife, C. 1996. On ice’s surface, a dance of molecules. Science 274:2012.
2. Second question: Where would you expect to find water?
Morrison, P. 1997. Wonders: HOH and life elsewhere. Scientific American (May):117, 119.
Pennisi, Elizabeth. 1993. Water, water, everywhere. Science News 143:121-125. Water plays many roles you may have not had occasion to consider - to date.
Jeanloz, Raymond. 1993. The hidden shore. The Sciences. 33(1):26-31. Here’s a dilemma. Can you afford to ignore it? Does it cost you?
Rand. R.P. Raising water to new heights. Science 256:618. ( also see Colombo, M, Rau, D. and V.A. Parsegian. 1992. Protein solvation in allosteric regulation: A water effect on hemoglobin. Science 256:655-659.) Just "taking up space".
3. Some basics (just in case you’re feeling a bit dizzy after the first papers).
Golterman, H. 1975. Stratification in deep lakes. Physiological Limnology. 145-152.
Stratification is unquestionably one of the most significant phenomena associated with limnology. This is a most thorough presentation of stratification which (I hope) you will find understandable
(after a rereading). This text, though expensive, and out of print is genuinely worth both the effort and the price if you are interested in Limnology. Any of the Wetzel texts also present the topic well. The important thing is that you are comfortable with the basis for stratification. It determines much of the community structure of a lake ecosystem. Again, no physics, no formulas, can you verbalize, "Why" lakes stratify?
Third question: Can you explain why "turnover" occurs in a freshwater, temperate zone, lake?Freeth, S. 1992. Incident at Lake Nyos: Tracking the source of a deadly cloud of gas. The Sciences 32(3):31-36. Plausible additional question: If you understand the extraordinary roles stratification can play, you could explain this with only the title - and likely be correct!
4. The following two papers FULLY explain why you have to read everything you can manage to read in your field - just to keep from putting your foot in your mouth. It is the reason for the odd skill I hope you develop during this term - an ability profitably to skim more written materials than you could ever manage to read carefully. Can you sort out why?Rousseau, D. 1992. Case studies in pathological science. American Scientist. 80:54-63.
Paul, D. 1987. The nine lives of discredited data. The Sciences 27(3)26-30.
One copy of the reading assignment papers will be upstairs (balcony reading area) wherever we agree to place it (probably on the shelf of the last reading desk.
Xeroxing - You cannot casually remove the book of readings and assume that it will not significantly interfere with another student in class - someone who has just made a rather long trip to the campus specifically to read the assignment. If you can find someone in the lab to cover, the copy can be temporarily removed and a note can direct other students to the lab. PLEASE - this is a small group - cooperation is not only plausible, it is practical. If you want to remove readings for a very short time (say for the time it takes to go to some available Xerox machine), this is the only way it can be done without causing problems for others. If I can stay around until you return the books, any other member of the class who comes in to read can check with me to be sure they are not wasting their time waiting for the return of said books. (This works - if you cooperate.)
You can always find a copy of the reading assignment sheet on the web. Just check the class homepage.