Long-term life-support in space requires renewable sources of oxygen and food that can survive and thrive in a closed system without any external inputs. In a closed-system experiment, three species of green algae were added to a nutrient mixture together with a grazer species, the common water flea (Daphnia magna). Despite calculations of the appropriate level of carbon and nitrogen needed in the mixture, the pH in the closed system rapidly increased to become highly alkaline (pH 10-11), so much so that most forms of life would not be able to survive. 

Managing fisheries usually follows one of three pathways: limiting catches, limiting fishing effort, or limiting where fishing can take place. In a new review, each of these pathways is explored to examine their biological, social and economic implications. Limiting catches includes guideline harvests, strict limits on the total catch, allocations to groups, division of the total catch among individual participants, and fully transferable individual rights to catch a portion of the total allowable catch. 

Water temperatures affect the length of salmon incubation, including the periods between spawning and hatching, and between hatching and the emergence of free-swimming fry. In Bristol Bay, Alaska, lake temperatures are predicted to increase by 0.7-1.4°C from 2015 to 2099 at the time of the year when incubation occurs, due to the effect of human emissions of greenhouse gases. As a result, sockeye salmon in Alaska will start hatching 16 to 30 days earlier than at present, according to a new model that examined the effects of climate change on 25 populations of sockeye salmon in four Alaskan lakes. 

Two new species of jawfishes (family Opistognathidae) have been described for the first time this month. These small fish have fascinating life histories, digging burrows in sandy bottoms near reefs, and relying on males to brood eggs in their mouths. Each burrow houses one fish, and they strongly defend their burrows. The first new species, Thionyi’s jawfish (Opistognathus thionyi), is found in Vitória-Trindade Chain and Fernando de Noronha Archipelago off Brazil; while the second new species, the Brazilian dusky jawfish (Opistognathus vicinus), is found off mainland Brazil. 

Polar bears, like other large predators, are hard to track and count, and available data is often fragmentary and difficult to piece together. Now, a new model provides estimates for key parameters for polar bears in the Chukchi Sea off north-western Alaska, by combining available data from telemetry, marking and recapturing, and counts. The model estimates that 83% of females give birth every year, that litter sizes are 2.11 per year, and that survival is about 90% for both males and females. 

Individual fishing quotas have been introduced to the Pacific whiting fishery off the US west coast, involving allocating rights to fish quota to both harvesters (80%) and processors (20%) and letting individuals decide when and how to to catch and land fish. A unique dataset of prices and costs allowed researchers to examine the impact of this change on land-based processors. 

Scientific surveys using fishing rods, each fishing multiple hooks, have the advantage of being able to access rocky areas while obtaining samples of fish for length and age estimation. However, in areas with lots of fish, it is possible for nearly every hook to catch a fish, resulting in an upper limit on the number of fish that can be counted. 

Fisheries management is often seen as a balancing act that aims for economic development, environmental protection and social development. Previous work shows that overfishing or other forms of poor ecological health, reduces economic profits; and it has long been assumed that pursuit of profits leads to poor social outcomes for fishing communities. But now a new analysis of 121 fisheries worldwide suggests this second assumption may not hold, based on scores of 68 different ecological, economic, and social metrics for each fishery. 

Oceanic discoveries of new species continue at pace, with a new species added to the 34,000 previously described: the Polkadot Dwarfgoby (Eviota maculosa). The new species occurs in New Guinea, Indonesia, and Pohnpei in the Federated States of Micronesia, and is distinguished by unique fin patterns, distinctive genetics, and multiple rows of trident-like teeth in both the upper and lower jaws. 

Forage fish are small, densely schooling fish at the heart of many marine ecosystems. These fish, including sardines, anchovies, menhaden and their kin, consume tremendous quantities of plankton and also provide abundant food for top marine predators such as larger fish and whales. A key characteristic of these species is their dramatic fluctuation in numbers between high “bonanza” periods and low “collapse” periods, which make them hard to manage.