Biology:Star sand

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Short description: Marine sediment made of foraminifera remains
Magnified star sand found in Okinawa
Yurigahama beach on Yoronjima is famous for its star sand[1]

Star sand (Japanese: 星砂, romanized: hoshizuna, lit. 'star-sand'),[2] also known as living sand,[3] is a rare sand-like substance made up of the star-shaped skeletal remains of marine foraminifera in the family Calcirinidae.[4][5][6][7] When the Calcirinids die, their skeletons are swept from their reef habitats and accumulate by the billions on shore.[8] A Japanese myth holds that grains of star sand are the skeletons of descendants of the North Star and the Southern Cross, fallen to the waters of Okinawa and killed by a serpent sent by the god of the sea.[5] Star sand is found on shores throughout the west and south Pacific, including in the Indonesian archipelago, the Okinawa Islands, and Raine Island.[5][9][10] Development of star sand causes beaches to "grow" over time as a result of the forams' life cycle,[5] with annual rates of calcium carbonate production as high as 1 kg/m2 near coral reef margins in the Pacific.[3] Because of this, laboratory production of star sand for beach renourishment has been developed in Japan.[11][12] The Japanese government has cultured star sand at Okinotorishima to build the islet into a more stable atoll and thus to strengthen Japan's legal claim to the surrounding waters, which otherwise would belong to China.[13][14] Up to three quarters of the sediment mass of Tuvalu is star sand.[15] Bottles of star sand are sold as souvenirs.[9][3] Arenophiles acquire samples of star sand through trade with other enthusiasts.[16] Collection of large quantities of star sand for commercial purposes from the Great Barrier Reef is prohibited.[17] Since 1979, the erosion of individual grains of Baculogypsina sphaerulata star sand has been used as a metric of littoral drift in Japan, with scientists using the lengths of the skeletal spines to reconstruct the origins and travel distances of sediment deposits.[18][2] A similar process of measuring star sand spines was used in 2012 to study depositional processes on Raine Reef in the Great Barrier Reef.[19]

See also

References

  1. ↑ Terry, James P. (2006). "Yoron Island in Southern Japan - Quaternary Geology and Solution Controls on Surface Land forms". South Pacific Studies 26 (2): 111–123. https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/144564925.pdf. 
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 秋山, 吉則 (1979). "漂砂の指標としての『星砂』の砕屑過程: 与論島北東部現成サンゴ礁を例として". 地理科学 31: 33–40. doi:10.20630/chirikagaku.31.0_33. https://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/article/chirikagaku/31/0/31_KJ00003718581/_article/-char/ja/. 
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 Lee, John J. (1995-04-01). "Living Sands: The symbiosis of protists and algae can provide good models for the study of host/symbiont interactions". BioScience 45 (4): 252–261. doi:10.2307/1312418. ISSN 0006-3568. https://academic.oup.com/bioscience/article-abstract/45/4/252/219834?redirectedFrom=fulltext. 
  4. ↑ Langer, Martin R.; Hottinger, Lukas (2000). "Biogeography of Selected "Larger" Foraminifera". Micropaleontology 46: 105–126. ISSN 0026-2803. https://www.jstor.org/stable/1486184. 
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 5.3 Hobson, Melissa. "This isn't a starfish—it's a rare sand found only in Japan". https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/okinawa-japan-star-sand. 
  6. ↑ Hohenegger, Johann (2012-04-26). "Inferences on Sediment Production and Transport at Carbonate Beaches Using Larger Foraminifera" (in EN). Carbonate Beaches 2000. pp. 112–125. doi:10.1061/40640(305)9. ISBN 978-0-7844-0640-3. https://ascelibrary.org/doi/10.1061/40640(305)9. 
  7. ↑ Lee, John J.; Cervasco, Megan H.; Morales, Jorge; Billik, Morgan; Fine, Maoz; Levy, Oren (July 2010). "Symbiosis drove cellular evolution: Symbiosis fueled evolution of lineages of Foraminifera (eukaryotic cells) into exceptionally complex giant protists" (in en). Symbiosis 51 (1): 13–25. doi:10.1007/s13199-010-0056-4. ISSN 0334-5114. Bibcode: 2010Symbi..51...13L. http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s13199-010-0056-4. 
  8. ↑ Burki, Fabien; Keeling, Patrick J. (February 2014). "Rhizaria" (in English). Current Biology 24 (3): R103–R107. doi:10.1016/j.cub.2013.12.025. ISSN 0960-9822. PMID 24502779. Bibcode: 2014CBio...24.R103B. https://www.cell.com/current-biology/fulltext/S0960-9822(13)01584-4. 
  9. ↑ 9.0 9.1 Hohenegger, Johann (2011). Large Foraminifera - Greenhouse constructions and gardeners in the oceanic microcosm. The Kagoshima University Museum Bulletin No.5. Kagoshima: The Kagoshima University Museum. ISBN 978-4-905464-00-6. https://www.museum.kagoshima-u.ac.jp/publications/LARGE%20FORAMINIFERA.pdf. 
  10. ↑ Limpus, Colin J; Limpus, Colin J.; Miller, Jeffrey D.; Parmenter, C. John; Limpus, Duncan J. (2003). "The green turtle, Chelonia mydas, population of Raine Island and the northern Great Barrier Reef: 1843-2001". Memoirs of the Queensland Museum 49 (1): 349––440. https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/part/249847. 
  11. ↑ Bird, Eric; Lewis, Nick (2015) (in en). Beach Renourishment. SpringerBriefs in Earth Sciences. Cham: Springer International Publishing. doi:10.1007/978-3-319-09728-2. ISBN 978-3-319-09727-5. Bibcode: 2015bere.book.....B. https://link.springer.com/10.1007/978-3-319-09728-2. 
  12. ↑ Hosono, Takashi; Lopati, Paeniu; Makolo, Filipo; Kayanne, Hajime (July 2014). "Mass culturing of living sands (Baculogypsina sphaerulata) to protect island coasts against sea-level rise". Journal of Sea Research 90: 121–126. doi:10.1016/j.seares.2014.03.007. ISSN 1385-1101. Bibcode: 2014JSR....90..121H. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.seares.2014.03.007. 
  13. ↑ Baldacchino, Godfrey (2017). "Worth nothing, yet worth everything: Why countries (may) go to war over small islands". Solution protocols to festering island disputes: "win-win" solutions for the Diaoyu/Senkaku Islands. Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY: Routledge. ISBN 978-1-4724-7518-3. 
  14. ↑ Root, Joshua L. (2016-01-01), "Castles in the Sand: Engineering Insular Formations to Gain Legal Rights over the Oceans", Chinese (Taiwan) Yearbook of International Law and Affairs, Volume 32 (2014) (Brill | Nijhoff): pp. 58–85, doi:10.1163/9789004316553_006, ISBN 978-90-04-31654-6, https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004316553_006, retrieved 2025-01-08 
  15. ↑ "Starry-eyed". The Economist. ISSN 0013-0613. https://www.economist.com/asia/2009/10/15/starry-eyed. 
  16. ↑ Coates, Peter (2020), Carruthers, Jo; Dakkak, Nour, eds., "An Eclectic A–Z of Sand: Removing, Treasuring, Recreating and Protecting" (in en), Sandscapes: Writing the British Seaside (Cham: Springer International Publishing): pp. 29–50, doi:10.1007/978-3-030-44780-9_3, ISBN 978-3-030-44780-9, https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-030-44780-9_3, retrieved 2025-01-07 
  17. ↑ Mabin, M. C. G. (1994). Field survey for carbonate, silica and quartzose sediment deposits. Research publication series no.22. Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority. 
  18. ↑ Yasukochi, Toru; Kayanne, Hajime; Yamaguchi, Toru; Yamano, Hiroya (2014-10-01). "Sedimentary facies and Holocene depositional processes of Laura Island, Majuro Atoll". Geomorphology. Coral Reef Geomorphology 222: 59–67. doi:10.1016/j.geomorph.2014.04.017. ISSN 0169-555X. Bibcode: 2014Geomo.222...59Y. https://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S0169555X14002207. 
  19. ↑ Dawson, J. L.; Hua, Q.; Smithers, S. G. (2012-07-19) (in en). Benthic foraminifera: their importance to future reef island resilience. International Coral Reef Society. ISBN 978-0-9808572-5-2. https://apo.ansto.gov.au/dspace/handle/10238/9482. 



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