BE/CNH: The Kuril Biocomplexity Project: Human Vulnerability and Resilience to Subarctic Change

BE/CNH：千岛生物复杂性项目：人类对亚北极变化的脆弱性和恢复力

• 批准号: 0508109
• 负责人: Ben Fitzhugh
• 金额: $ 171.02万
• 依托单位: University of Washington
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2005
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2005-09-15 至 2012-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0508109&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: CNH; Kuril; Biocomplexity; Project; Human

Subarctic coastal communities today face natural and human induced changes in the environment and in access to critical food resources. How well these communities can adapt is both constrained and facilitated by engagement in local and global social, political, and economic networks. Understanding the complexity of these interactions is critical to the effective management of human response to change in the subarctic and elsewhere. This research project will bring together an interdisciplinary team of American, Japanese, and Russian scholars and students to examine the 5,000-year history of human-environmental interactions along the Kuril Island chain in the northwest Pacific. Evidence of human colonization, persistence and abandonment at various times in the past five millennia and under different social, economic, and technological regimes will be used to study human vulnerability and resilience to both catastrophic and gradual environmental changes, including human-induced changes. The project's primary objectives include (1) understanding feedbacks among climate, sea ice, marine and terrestrial ecology, and human activity; (2) estimating the degree of human vulnerability to catastrophic events and their ecological consequences at different spatial and temporal scales; and (3) assessing the role of cultural variables both in influencing community survival and affecting environmental changes. These objectives will be tackled through an ecologically integrated study of archaeological and historic records of human settlement and abandonment; geologic evidence of volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, and tsunamis; paleoecologic and oceanographic evidence of past vegetation and marine conditions; and climatological evidence of past temperature, sea ice, and storminess. Evidence collected in the field over three summers will be used to test and calibrate agent-based computer models and simulations. Numerical models will be run to detect the most critical social, ecological, and physical variables affecting human resilience and vulnerability. The project will include education and outreach partnerships with indigenous Ainu communities in Hokkaido, Japan; the development of secondary school education kits and interactive computer simulations through the Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture at the University of Washington; and the participation of undergraduate and graduate students throughout the project.This study will make significant contributions to understanding the complexity of coupled human and natural systems. The research will advance the theory of human ecological dynamics and of the ways social and technological variables buffer or aggravate human vulnerability to unpredictable ecological changes and catastrophic events. This project will develop new modeling tools to facilitate interdisciplinary integration and understanding. It will provide models that can be adapted to other contexts and modern conditions where coastal communities appear particularly vulnerable to environmental and social factors beyond their control. More generally, this research will provide tools in the form of model prototypes that can be adapted to many different regions where human-environmental dynamics are complex. This project is supported by an award resulting from the FY 2005 special competition in Biocomplexity in the Environment focusing on the Dynamics of Coupled Natural and Human Systems.

今天，亚北极沿海社区在环境和获取关键食物资源方面面临自然和人为的变化。这些社区在多大程度上能够适应，既受到当地和全球社会、政治和经济网络参与的制约，也受到其促进。了解这些相互作用的复杂性对于有效管理人类对亚北极和其他地区变化的反应至关重要。这一研究项目将汇集一个由美国、日本和俄罗斯学者和学生组成的跨学科团队，研究西北太平洋千岛岛链沿线5000年来人类与环境相互作用的历史。在过去五千年的不同时期，在不同的社会、经济和技术制度下，人类被殖民、坚持和抛弃的证据将被用来研究人类对灾难性和渐进性环境变化，包括人类引起的变化的脆弱性和复原力。该项目的主要目标包括：(1)了解气候、海冰、海洋和陆地生态以及人类活动之间的反馈；(2)在不同的空间和时间尺度上估计人类对灾难性事件及其生态后果的脆弱程度；(3)评估文化变量在影响社区生存和影响环境变化方面的作用。这些目标将通过对人类定居和遗弃的考古和历史记录；火山喷发、地震和海啸的地质证据；过去植被和海洋条件的古生态和海洋学证据；以及过去温度、海冰和风暴的气候学证据的生态综合研究来实现。三个夏天在现场收集的证据将用于测试和校准基于代理的计算机模型和模拟。将运行数字模型，以检测影响人类复原力和脆弱性的最关键的社会、生态和物理变量。该项目将包括与日本北海道的土著Ainu社区建立教育和外联伙伴关系；通过华盛顿大学伯克自然历史和文化博物馆开发中学教育工具包和互动计算机模拟；以及本科生和研究生参与整个项目。这项研究将对理解人类与自然耦合系统的复杂性做出重大贡献。这项研究将推进人类生态动力学理论，以及社会和技术变量如何缓冲或加剧人类对不可预测的生态变化和灾难性事件的脆弱性。该项目将开发新的建模工具，以促进跨学科的整合和理解。它将提供可适应沿海社区似乎特别容易受到超出其控制范围的环境和社会因素影响的其他情况和现代条件的模式。更广泛地说，这项研究将以模型原型的形式提供工具，这些工具可以适应人类环境动态复杂的许多不同地区。该项目得到了2005财年环境中生物复杂性特别竞赛的一个奖项的支持，该竞赛的重点是自然和人类耦合系统的动力学。