RAPID: Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill Effects on Metal, Nutrient, and Organic Matter Distributions in the Water

这项研究旨在了解正在进行的深水地平线漏油事件对受影响地区化学物质分布的影响。由于石油泄漏的持续性质以及其过程的不确定性(即，它可能在任何时候停止或无限期地继续)，现在对这一事件进行采样至关重要。金属、营养物质和有机物在影响生物群的地球化学过程中都扮演着重要的角色。漏油区域是一个重要的渔业，因此，了解漏油如何影响化学分布是了解其对食物链影响的一个重要方面。通过这笔快速反应研究拨款(RAPID)，南密西西比大学的研究人员将研究石油泄漏如何以及在多大程度上影响金属和营养物质的分布。这既包括直接影响(例如，镍在原油中富含)，也包括间接影响，即泄漏可能会影响某些其他因素或过程，从而影响金属和营养物质(例如，通过耗尽氧气)。他们将使用大学可用的船只和机遇船在受灾地区进行调查。他们还将分析过去一周在漏油区域收集的样本。首席调查员的实验室已经有了大部分受影响地区的泄漏前基线数据。因此，他们有了一个理解和解释将要收集的数据的背景。布罗德影响对石油泄漏对微量元素分布的影响知之甚少。因此，这项工作的更广泛影响在于帮助了解正在污染一个重要渔业的严重漏油事件的一些影响。调查人员还将让一名学生参与这项工作。由于石油泄漏的影响引起了广泛的兴趣，结果不仅将在综述的文献中传播，而且调查结果也可能被大众媒体转载。

This study is aimed at understanding the effect of the ongoing Deepwater Horizon oil spill on chemical distributions in the affected area. Because of the ongoing nature of the oil spill as well as the uncertainty of it course (i.e., it could stop at any time or continue indefinitely), sampling this event now is critical. Metals, nutrients, and organic matter all play important roles in the geochemical processes affecting the biota. The oil spill region is an important fishery and thus understanding how the spill is affecting chemical distributions is a vital aspect of understanding its impact on the food chain. With funding through this Grant for Rapid Response Research (RAPID), investigators at the University of Southern Mississippi will examine how and to what extent metal and nutrient distributions are affected by the oil spill. This includes both direct effects (e.g., Ni is enriched in crude oil) as well as indirect effects wherein the spill could affect some other factor or process that they affects metals and nutrients (e.g., via oxygen depletion). They will conduct surveys in the affected area using both boats available to the university as well as ships of opportunity. They will also analyze samples collected in the past week in the oil spill area. The principal investigator's laboratory already has pre-spill baseline data for much of the affected area. Thus, thus they have a context for understanding and interpreting the data that will be gathered.Broader Impacts Little is known about the impact of oil spills on trace element distributions. Thus, a broader impact of this work lies in helping understand some of the impacts of a serious oil spill which is contaminating an important fishery. The investigators will also involve a student in this work. Because of the wide interest in the impact of the oil spill, the results will not only be disseminated in the reviewed literature, but the findings are also likely to picked up by the popular media.