COLLABORATIVE RESEARCH: PERSISTENT ORGANIC POLLUTANTS IN THE ANTARCTIC MARINE FOOD WEB: IMPACT OF CLIMATE CHANGE AND INSIGHTS INTO THE FEEDING ECOLOGY OF APEX PREDATORS

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This award is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5).Persistent organic pollutants (POPs) persist in the environment, undergo long-range atmospheric transport to polar regions, accumulate in biological tissues, biomagnify (increase in concentration with trophic level) in food webs, and cause adverse effects. The overall goal of this project is to use chemical signals in Antarctic marine organisms to: (a) trace the movement of POPs stored in glacier ice into the Antarctic marine food web, and (b) provide insight into the dietary preferences and feeding ecology of Antarctic seabirds and marine mammals. This goal will be achieved through a fully coordinated and collaborative research effort by U.S. and Swedish scientists that will generate intercalibrated chemical data for a variety of Antarctic marine organisms ranging in trophic level from phytoplankton to top predators (seabirds, seals, and whales). The intellectual merit of the proposed research includes providing an understanding of the potential coupling between global climate change and mobilization of glacier reservoirs of contaminants. As such, it is likely to serve as a case study for understanding the potential future impact of contaminants stored in glaciers on regional aquatic ecosystems. Secondly, this research is expected to provide insights into the feeding ecology of Antarctic organisms at various trophic levels. The broader impacts of the proposed research project will include: (a) a strong potential to enhance scientific understanding through publicizing research findings in diverse nontechnical media that reach broad audiences, (b) establishing a research and education collaboration between faculty and students from a predominantly graduate research institution (Virginia Institute of Marine Science) and a predominantly undergraduate institution (Chatham College for Women), and (c) enhancing U.S research infrastructure by establishing a research collaboration between U.S. institutions and international partners at Stockholm University and the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences.