Research Projects in the Gulf of Eilat/Aqaba
Updated: 11/08/2004
In December 2001, an International Expert Team (IET) on Evaluation of Pollution in the Gulf of Aqaba/Eilat presented its report to the Government of Israel. The IET was appointed by the Ministries of Agriculture, Environment and National Infrastructures to identify existing and potential sources of pollution in the Gulf of Eilat/Aqaba, to assess the carrying capacity of the Gulf for fish-farming, and to formulate recommendations for minimization of pollution and environmental pressures. Among its main recommendations was the need for further monitoring and research in order to assess the carrying capacity of the Gulf. In line with this recommendation, the Ministries of Environment, Agriculture and National Infrastructures commissioned a series of professional research studies to assess the state of pollution in the Gulf of Eilat/Aqaba. The program, carried out from July 2002 to June 2004, consisted of 14 projects, which were implemented by researchers from the Interuniversity Institute for Marine Sciences in Eilat (IUI), the Israel Oceanographic and Limnological Research (IOLR) and the Geological Survey of Israel. The research studies were presented to the Chief Scientists of the three ministries on July 2004. They analyze, for the first time ever, a very large quantity of data in a wide range of topics, including a-biotic matters (such as temperature and circulation) in the Gulf of Eilat/Aqaba. While most of the projects were specifically recommended by the IET, a few additional projects were designed to provide complementary information related to the issues discussed in the IET report and to other aspects of environmental management of the northern Gulf of Aqaba. The projects are presented below in their original, unedited versions under the responsibility of the different researchers. They are accompanied by an integrated project summary and comments and conclusions concerning the results of the program by Prof. Ottolenghi, Scientific Director of the IUI and Dr. Yuval Cohen, Director General of IOLR. Project No. | Research Title | Principal Investigators | Final Report | Gulf of Eilat Monitoring and Research Program -IET : Recommendations | Y. Cohen
Director General, IOLR;
M.Ottolenghi
Scientific Director, IUI | IET Project No. A | Nutrient Flux into the Gulf of Elat through the Groundwater System | Amos Bein, Einat Magal and Yoseph Yechieli (GSI ) | IET Project No. B1 | Distribution and Biological Effects of Detergents in the Red Sea | Zvy Dubinsky (IUI) | IET Project No. B2 | Preliminary screening for organic and metal pollutants in the northern Gulf of Eilat | Barak Herut (IOLR) and Ludwik Halicz (GSI) | IET Project No. C | Nitrogen Fixation in the Gulf of Eilat | Ora Hadas (IOLR) and Jonathan Erez (IUI) | IET Project No. 6 | High Resolution Simulations with the Princeton Ocean Model | Steve Brenner (IOLR) and Nathan Paldor (IUI) | IET Project No. 7,
Report No. 7a | Concentrating and analyzing the available chemical data | Boaz Lazar and Jonathan Erez (IUI) | IET Project No. 7,
Report No. 7b | Analysis of existing nutrient data sets for the Gulf of Aqaba :1975 - 2003 | Barak Herut and Yuval Cohen (IOLR) | IET Project No. 8 | Fluxes of nutrients from the sediments of the Gulf of Eilat | Jonathan Erez (IUI) and Ami Nishri (IOLR) | IET Project No. 9 | Nutrient measurements at stations A1, B1 | Boaz Lazar and Jonathan Erez (IUI) | IET Project No. 11 | Reconnaissance study on sedimentary phosphorus in the northern Gulf of Eilat | Barak Herut and Ami Nishri (IOLR) | IET Project No. 12 | Analysis of water temperature variability in the Gulf of Eilat | Isaac Gertman and Steve Brenner (IOLR) | IET Project No. 16a | Metabolic Studies in the Coral Reef: Community metabolism | Jacob Silverman, Boaz Lazar and Jonathan Erez (IUI) | IET Project No. 16c | Metabolic studies in the coral reef: Cellular-level biomarkers | Avigdor Abelson and Vladimir Bresler (IUI) | IET Project No. 18 | Coral Recruitment | Avigdor Abelson (IUI) | IET Project No. 22 | Monitoring program of mortality and disease in wild fish populations in the Gulf of Eilat, northern Red Sea | Ariel Diamant, Angelo Colorni and Michal Ucko (IOLR) | | | |
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