@article {6253, title = {The tarballs on Texas beaches following the 2014 Texas City {\textquotedblleft}Y{\textquotedblright} Spill: Modeling, chemical, and microbiological studies.}, journal = {Marine Pollution Bulletin}, volume = {109}, number = {1}, year = {2016}, pages = {236-244}, abstract = {We modeled the transport of oil, source-fingerprinted 44 tarball samples from Galveston Island (GV) and Mustang Island (MT), and determined the hydrocarbon and bacterial community composition of these tarballs following the 2014 Texas City {\textquotedblleft}Y{\textquotedblright} Oil Spill (TCY). Transport modeling indicated that the tarballs arrived in MT before the samples were collected. Source-fingerprinting confirmed that the tarballs collected from GV and MT, 6\ d and 11\ d after the TCY, respectively, originated from the spill. Tarballs from GV showed 21\% depletion of alkanes, mainly C9{\textendash}C17, and 55\% depletion of PAHs mainly naphthalenes, and dominated by alkane-degrading\ Alcanivorax\ and\ Psychrobacter. Samples from MT were depleted of 24\% alkanes and 63\% PAHs, and contained mainly of PAH-degrading\ Pseudoalteromonas. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study to relate oil transport, tarball source-fingerprinting, chemistry, and microbiology, which provides insights on the fate of oil in the northern Gulf of Mexico.}, url = {http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0025326X16303964}, author = {Bacosa, Hernando P and Thyng, Kristen M. and Plunkett, Stephanie and Deana L. Erdner and Liu, Zhanfei} }