8
Gerardo M.E. Perillo· M. Cintia Piccolo· Mario Pino-Quivira
best example of the latter is Patos Lagoon (see Moeller and Castaing and Niencheski
et aI., both in this book) the largest of this kind of water bodies in the world. Most of
the Uruguaian lagoons are intermittent, meaning that during the low raining season
their mouths are closed by littoral drift. When the freshwater discharge is enough to
reopen the mouth, it may change the direction of the inlet depending on the present
littoral conditions, developing sharp curved meandering channels.
The Rio de la Plata is a very special feature since it is the widest estuary in the world,
with dynamical conditions remarkable different of most other estuaries. Although
several studies have covered many aspects of this estuary (see Piccolo and Perillo,
Lopez Laborde and Nagy, and Framifian et aI., this book), there is still much work to
be done to reach a basic understanding of both its geomorphologic and dynamic characteristics. Further to the south, along the Argentina coast, there are over 20 estuaries
plus four coastal lagoons basically controlled by the relationship between tidal range
and freshwater input (see Piccolo and Perillo, this book).
1.4
International Publications About South American Estuaries
In defining the degree of knowledge that exists about South American estuaries in
relation with other countries and/or continents, we made a bibliographic analysis of
the papers published in the two journals with main emphasis in estuarine research.
They are dedicated to an international audience and open to contributions from all
over the world. The selected journals are Estuaries (published by the Estuarine Research Federation, USA) and Estuarine, Coastal and Shelf Science (ECSS) formerly
known as Estuarine, Coastal Marine Science (published by the Estuarine, Coastal Science Association, UK).
For the analysis we considered only those articles totally related to one or more
estuaries and also to their geographical location. Based on a geographic criteria, the
papers were subdivided into seven regions: USA/Canada, Central America/Mexico,
Europe, Asia, Africa, South America and Oceania. An eighth subdivision was defined
for those papers dealing with theoretical approaches in which no particular estuary
is mentioned in the text.
Figure 1.5 provides the percentage distribution for a total of 1120 papers fully devoted to estuaries that were published in the period 1988-1997 in both journals. As a
first approach, it is clearly evident from the figure the immense bias existing for papers published on estuaries of USA, Canada and Europe. Almost 77% (861 papers) of
the total were related to estuaries found on these three regions. Only a dozen of papers considered comparisons among estuaries in USA and Europe, and only one between Oceania and Europe. In this case, the representatives of each region was given
in proportion to the number of estuaries described for each region in the paper (i.e., if
two estuaries were mentioned, one for USA and one for Europe, each region received 0.5). Table 1.1 gives the total number of published papers discriminated by region and journal. For this wide scope, we did not separate the papers according to their
main subject(s) but during our scrutiny we observed that over 75% of the papers were
dealing with biological approaches.
The added percentage of papers on Africa, Asia, Central America/Mexico and South
America estuaries (13.29%) is lower by almost 61% those from Europe alone and more
Gerardo M.E. Perillo· M. Cintia Piccolo· Mario Pino-Quivira
best example of the latter is Patos Lagoon (see Moeller and Castaing and Niencheski
et aI., both in this book) the largest of this kind of water bodies in the world. Most of
the Uruguaian lagoons are intermittent, meaning that during the low raining season
their mouths are closed by littoral drift. When the freshwater discharge is enough to
reopen the mouth, it may change the direction of the inlet depending on the present
littoral conditions, developing sharp curved meandering channels.
The Rio de la Plata is a very special feature since it is the widest estuary in the world,
with dynamical conditions remarkable different of most other estuaries. Although
several studies have covered many aspects of this estuary (see Piccolo and Perillo,
Lopez Laborde and Nagy, and Framifian et aI., this book), there is still much work to
be done to reach a basic understanding of both its geomorphologic and dynamic characteristics. Further to the south, along the Argentina coast, there are over 20 estuaries
plus four coastal lagoons basically controlled by the relationship between tidal range
and freshwater input (see Piccolo and Perillo, this book).
1.4
International Publications About South American Estuaries
In defining the degree of knowledge that exists about South American estuaries in
relation with other countries and/or continents, we made a bibliographic analysis of
the papers published in the two journals with main emphasis in estuarine research.
They are dedicated to an international audience and open to contributions from all
over the world. The selected journals are Estuaries (published by the Estuarine Research Federation, USA) and Estuarine, Coastal and Shelf Science (ECSS) formerly
known as Estuarine, Coastal Marine Science (published by the Estuarine, Coastal Science Association, UK).
For the analysis we considered only those articles totally related to one or more
estuaries and also to their geographical location. Based on a geographic criteria, the
papers were subdivided into seven regions: USA/Canada, Central America/Mexico,
Europe, Asia, Africa, South America and Oceania. An eighth subdivision was defined
for those papers dealing with theoretical approaches in which no particular estuary
is mentioned in the text.
Figure 1.5 provides the percentage distribution for a total of 1120 papers fully devoted to estuaries that were published in the period 1988-1997 in both journals. As a
first approach, it is clearly evident from the figure the immense bias existing for papers published on estuaries of USA, Canada and Europe. Almost 77% (861 papers) of
the total were related to estuaries found on these three regions. Only a dozen of papers considered comparisons among estuaries in USA and Europe, and only one between Oceania and Europe. In this case, the representatives of each region was given
in proportion to the number of estuaries described for each region in the paper (i.e., if
two estuaries were mentioned, one for USA and one for Europe, each region received 0.5). Table 1.1 gives the total number of published papers discriminated by region and journal. For this wide scope, we did not separate the papers according to their
main subject(s) but during our scrutiny we observed that over 75% of the papers were
dealing with biological approaches.
The added percentage of papers on Africa, Asia, Central America/Mexico and South
America estuaries (13.29%) is lower by almost 61% those from Europe alone and more