- Lombok Strait
The Lombok Strait is a
strait connecting theJava Sea to theIndian Ocean , located between theisland s ofBali andLombok inIndonesia .Its narrowest point is at its southern opening, with a width of only 18 km, but at the northern opening it is 40 km across. Total length is about 60 km. Because it is 250 m deep [ cite web
url= http://www.tos.org/oceanography/issues/issue_archive/issue_pdfs/18_4/18.4_susanto_et_al.pdf
title= Ocean Internal Waves Observed in the Lombok Strait | pages = p. 83
last= Susanto | first= R. Dwi | coauthors= Leonid Mitnik, and Quanan Zheng
date= Dec. 2005 | format=PDF | work= Oceanography | publisher= The Oceanography Society
accessdate= 2008-05-16 ] — much deeper than theStrait of Malacca — ships that draw too much water to pass through Malacca (so-called "postMalaccamax " vessels) often use the Lombok Strait, instead.The Lombok Strait is notable as one of the main passages for the
Indonesian throughflow that exchanges water between the Indian Ocean and thePacific Ocean .It is also part of the biogeographical boundary between the fauna of
Indo-Malaysia and the distinctly different fauna ofAustralasia . The boundary is known as theWallace Line , forAlfred Russel Wallace , who first remarked upon the striking difference between animals of Indo-Malaysia from those of Australasia and how abrupt the boundary was between the twobiomes .Biologists believe it was the depth of the Lombok Strait itself that kept the animals on either side isolated from one another. When sea levels dropped during the
Pleistocene ice age , the islands of Bali, Java andSumatra were all connected to one another and to the mainland of Asia. They shared the Asian fauna. The Lombok Strait's deep water kept Lombok and the Lesser Sunda archipelago isolated from the Asian mainland. These islands were, instead, colonized by Australasian fauna.References
*van Oosterzee, Penny (1997). "Where Worlds Collide: the Wallace Line".
* [http://www.fieldmuseum.org/research_collections/zoology/zoo_sites/seamaps/mapindex.htm Pleistocene Sea Level Maps]
* [http://www.starfish.ch/dive/Wallacea.html Wallacea - a transition zone from Asia to Australia, specially rich in marine life and on land.]
* Dawkins, Richard (2004). "The Ancestors Tale". Weidenfeld & Nicolson. ISBN 0-7538-1996-1. Chapter 14 - Marsupials.ee also
*
Sunda Strait
*Makassar Strait
*Wallace Line
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.