US-Denmark Cooperative Research: Synthesis of Physio- logically Based Carbon Models for Salt Marsh Ecosystems

该奖项为南卡罗来纳大学的詹姆斯·t·莫里斯博士对丹麦的长期研究访问提供部分支持。他将与奥胡斯大学植物研究所的阿恩·詹森博士和其他人合作，对盐沼碳循环进行比较研究。莫里斯博士多年来一直在研究沼泽中的二氧化碳交换、分解和养分吸收，并提出了几个基于这些过程的生理学模型。与詹森博士一起，他将把这些模型应用于丹麦的斯卡林根盐沼，并利用这些模型探索北欧和美国东南部气候不同的沼泽的碳循环差异。他们还计划将这些模型结合成一个综合的生态系统水平模型，该模型将用于预测盐沼碳循环的动态，包括地下生产。合作计划为莫里斯博士提供了一个截然不同的沼泽环境，一个由詹森博士领导的优秀植物生态学家团队，以及一个世界知名的河口生物地球化学家团队。他希望学习遥感技术和植物生理学的新方法，并从欧洲不同的生态学概念和方法中受益。作为回报，丹麦小组将受益于莫里斯博士在数值模拟方面的专业知识。盐沼是沿温带大陆边缘普遍存在的高产生态系统。这些生态系统的初级生产被认为是商业上重要鱼类的重要营养来源。盐沼还具有有机碳汇的功能；然而，对盐沼中碳循环的认识是不完整的。由于抽样误差，地下初级采收率特别难以测量，而且存在很大的不确定性。拟议的合作预计将产生一个理论上可靠的模型，该模型将有助于预测或评价盐沼的初级生产和其他碳循环过程。该模型结构具有通用性，标定后可应用于其他系统。

This award provides partial support for a long-term research visit to Denmark by Dr. James T. Morris of the University of South Carolina. He will collaborate with Dr. Arne Jensen and others of the Botanical Institute of the University of Aarhus in a comparative study of salt marsh carbon cycles. Dr. Morris has studied carbon dioxide exchange, decomposition and nutrient uptake in marshes for many years, and has produced several physiologically based models of these processes. With Dr. Jensen, he will adapt these models to Skallingen salt marsh in Denmark, and use the models to explore differences in the carbon cycles of climatically dissimilar marshes from Northern Europe and the Southeastern United States. They also plan to combine these models into an integrated ecosystem level model that will be used to predict the dynamics of salt marsh carbon cycles, including below- ground production. The collaborative plan provides Dr. Morris with access to a vastly different marsh environment, an excellent group of plant ecologists, led by Dr. Jensen, and a world renowned group of estuarine biogeochemists. He expects to learn remote sensing skills and new methods in plant physiology, as well as benefit from the different concepts and approaches to ecology in Europe. In return, the Danish group should benefit from Dr. Morris'expertise in numerical modelling. Salt marshes are highly productive ecosystems that exist worldwide along continental margins in the temperate zone. Primary production in these ecosystems is thought to be an important source of nutrition for commercially important fishes. Salt marshes also function as sinks for organic carbon; however, knowledge of the carbon cycle in salt marshes is incomplete. The rate of below-ground primary production has been especially difficult to measure and is subject to great uncertainty due to sampling error. The proposed collaboration is expected to result in a theoretically robust model that will be useful for predicting or evaluating primary production and other carbon cycle processes in salt marshes. The structure of the model is general and could be applied to other systems when calibrated.