Collaborative Research: Downscaling global climate projections to the ecosystems of the Bering Sea with nested biophysical models

为白令海的物理和生态系统结构建模提供了资金。 气候强迫的变化将根据为政府间气候变化专门委员会（气专委）第四次评估报告所作的大气-海洋环流耦合模式模拟来确定。 这些模式对20世纪世纪的后报在复制过去观测条件的能力方面有所不同;将使用一组较好的模式来预测21世纪上半叶白令海气候的趋势、变率和不确定性。 这套GCM模式结果将主要用于动态降尺度，即，作为区域海洋模拟系统高分辨率海洋模型实验的初始和边界条件。 ROMS模拟的目的是妥善处理物理过程中已知的重要的白令海大陆架，如海冰，潮汐和跨大陆架交换，这些结果将形成嵌入式空间显式营养浮游植物浮游动物（NPZ）和食物网模型实验的直接输入。该项目是一个更大的计划的一部分，旨在发展对白令海东部大陆架综合生态系统的理解，这是美国沿海沃茨的一个高产地区。 这个生态系统是美国商业渔业的主要部分，也为阿拉斯加的猎人和渔民提供了重要的资源。 该模型将有助于综合我们目前和发展中国家对这一系统如何运作的理解。

Funds are provided to model the physics and ecosystem structure of the Bering Sea. Change in climate forcing will be determined from coupled atmosphere-ocean general circulation model (GCM) simulations made for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Fourth Assessment Report (AR4). The twentieth century hindcasts from these models differ in terms of their ability to replicate past observed conditions; a subset of the better models will be used to project the trends, variability and uncertainty of the climate of the Bering Sea through the first half of the 21st century. This ensemble of GCM model results will be used primarily for dynamical downscaling, i.e., as initial and boundary conditions for high-resolution ocean model experiments with the Regional Ocean Modeling System (ROMS). The ROMS simulations are designed to properly handle physical processes known to be important on the Bering Sea shelf, such as sea ice, tides, and cross-shelf exchange; these results will form the direct input for embedded spatially-explicit nutrient-phytoplankton-zooplankton (NPZ) and food web model experiments. This project is part of a larger program designed to develop understanding of the integrated ecosystem of the eastern Bering Sea shelf, a highly productive region of US coastal waters. This ecosystem is home to a major portion of the commercial fisheries of the US and also provides significant resources to subsistence hunters and fisherman of Alaska. The model will help to synthesize our current and developing understanding of how this system functions.