Recent investigations of water balance in sea snakes demonstrated that amphibious sea kraits (Laticauda spp.) dehydrate in seawater and require fresh water to restore deficits in body water. Here, we report similar findings for Pelamis platurus, a viviparous, pelagic, entirely marine species of hydrophiine ("true") sea snake. We sampled snakes at Golfo de Papagayo, Guanacaste, Costa Rica and de...

The coastal spotted dolphin (Stenella attenuata graffmani) is one of the most common species of dolphin in inshore Pacific waters of Costa Rica. We conducted surveys in protected waters of the Papagayo Gulf, Costa Rica, to determine relative abundance of dolphins in relation to environmental variables. We used Generalized Additive Models to investigate the influence of a particular set of envir...

Thirty-one sediment samples collected from 1996-2003 from the Gulf of Nicoya estuary on the northwestern coast of Costa Rica, have been obtained for PCB analyses. This is part of the first study to evaluate the PCB contamination in coastal Costa Rica. Overall, the concentrations are low, especially when compared to sediments from more temperate climates and/or sediments from more heavily indust...

Lightning activity has been recognized to have, historically, social and environmental consequences around the globe. This work analyzes space-time distribution of lightning-densities (D) in an extended Central America region (ECA). World Wide Location Network data was analyzed link D with dominant climate patterns over ECA for 2012–2020. associated cold surges entering tropics dominate during ...

This study analyzes a relatively high resolution (15 km grid spacing), regional coupled ocean–atmosphere simulation configured over Central America. The is conducted with the Regional Spectral Model-Regional Ocean Model System (RSM-ROMS) forced global atmospheric and oceanic reanalysis for period of 25 years (1986–2010). spatial RSM-ROMS unprecedented region. highlights RCM include verifiable s...

Sea surface height measurements from the TOPEX altimeter and dynamic height from Tropical Ocean-Global Atmosphere Tropical Atmosphere-Ocean (TOGA TAO) moorings are used to explore sea level variability in the northeastern tropical Pacific Ocean. After the annual harmonic is removed, there are two distinct bands of variability: one band is centered at 5øN to 7øN and extends from 165øW to 110øW, ...