RAPID: Effects of PAH Exposure on Aquatic Plant Community Structure, Productivity, and Resilience as a Result of the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill

RAPID：深水地平线漏油事件导致 PAH 暴露对水生植物群落结构、生产力和恢复力的影响

• 批准号: 1059916
• 负责人: Kelly Major
• 金额: $ 11.77万
• 依托单位: University of South Alabama
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2010
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2010-09-01 至 2012-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1059916&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: RAPID; Effects; PAH; Exposure; Aquatic

The Mobile-Tensaw Delta in Alabama represents a sensitive, integrated ecosystem where terrestrial, freshwater, and coastal communities converge to create a transition zone, characterized by high productivity and biological diversity, making it ecologically, economically, and recreationally important to the Gulf region. This project investigates the effects of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon (PAH) exposure on native aquatic plant communities in this biodiversity hotspot. The investigators have 9 years of data on plant community structure in hand, and they will use these data in a Before-After-Control-Impact design to determine how plant productivity and survivorship are influenced by the anticipated gradient of exposure to PAHs; differences in early successional patterns and community resilience across this gradient; and the presence of thresholds in exposure beyond which plant communities fail to recover. The resulting data will be used to predict how large-scale anthropogenic insults and natural environmental variation affect aquatic plant communities over varying spatial and temporal scales. The results of this project will provide fundamental insight into the broader impacts of environmental degradation and habitat loss, serving as the foundation for later work concerning both basic and applied aspects of the plant community response, and the underlying mechanisms of resilience and susceptibility to stress. Over the course of this one-year project, one graduate and one undergraduate student will receive training in plant taxonomy, physiology, community ecology, and the application of multivariate statistics. Finally, data generated from this research will be an important contribution to plant community conservation and land management.

阿拉巴马州的莫比尔-天索三角洲代表了一个敏感的、综合的生态系统，在这里，陆地、淡水和沿海社区汇聚在一起，形成了一个过渡区，其特点是高生产力和生物多样性，使其在生态、经济和娱乐方面对海湾地区具有重要意义。本项目研究了深水地平线石油泄漏和多环芳烃（PAH）暴露对该生物多样性热点地区本地水生植物群落的影响。研究人员掌握了9年的植物群落结构数据，他们将利用这些数据进行控制影响前-控制影响后设计，以确定植物的生产力和存活率如何受到预期暴露于多环芳烃的梯度的影响；该梯度的早期演替模式和群落恢复力差异；并且存在暴露阈值，超过这个阈值植物群落就无法恢复。所得数据将用于预测大尺度的人为破坏和自然环境变化如何在不同的时空尺度上影响水生植物群落。该项目的结果将为了解环境退化和栖息地丧失的更广泛影响提供基础见解，为后续植物群落响应的基础和应用方面的工作以及对压力的恢复和易感性的潜在机制奠定基础。在这个为期一年的项目中，一名研究生和一名本科生将接受植物分类学、生理学、群落生态学和多元统计应用方面的培训。最后，本研究产生的数据将为植物群落保护和土地管理做出重要贡献。