CAREER: How will marine ecosystems respond to climate change? Integrating K-12 teaching and paleoceanographic research

由于人为过程，地球海洋生态系统和碳循环目前正在发生根本性的变化，但人们对这些变化的影响仍知之甚少。古海洋学记录为了解过去生态系统如何应对快速气候变化提供了独特的机会。这项工作由加州大学戴维斯分校的一名教员领导，将利用圣巴巴拉盆地（SBB）的精美沉积物记录来重建海底生物多样性如何在过去快速变暖的时期对温度和氧合的变化做出反应。该项目建立在最近发现的各种无脊椎动物分类群的基础上，包括节肢动物、软体动物和棘皮动物，大量保存在SBB沉积物中，因此可以直接与更成熟的气候变化记录进行比较。沉积群落的调查将集中在三个方面：1)现代动物群，使用最近收集的加利福尼亚边缘300-1200米的箱形岩心；2)SBB岩心的深度样带，跨越冰川消退，近代地质史上最突然的气候变化；3)中更新世沉积物记录，提供了过去1 Ma期间普遍存在的千年尺度气候变化的证据。理解气候变化对海洋环境影响的复杂性的关键是综合生物、地质、化学和物理信息。这项研究将直接解决这一问题，并通过与加州大学戴维斯分校成功的数学和科学教学（MAST）项目合作，努力培养未来的数学和科学教师和K-12学生。每年，MAST学生将在秋季开发，测试和修改气候科学课程，然后将在第二年春天用于参观教室。夏季奖学金将为MAST学生提供全额资助（2/年），用于在Bodega海洋实验室（BML）参加夏季强化课程并完成独立研究项目。在完成他们的MAST奖学金后，学生将利用他们独立的研究项目和数据作为下一轮由MAST学生主导的课程开发的灵感。

Fundamental shifts in the Earth's ocean ecosystems and carbon cycle are currently underway due to anthropogenic processes, and the implications of these shifts are still poorly understood. Paleoceanographic records provide a unique opportunity to understand how ecosystems have responded to rapid climate change in the past. This work, led by a faculty member at the University of California at Davis, will utilize exquisite sediment records from Santa Barbara Basin (SBB) to reconstruct how seafloor biodiversity responded to changes in temperature and oxygenation during past time periods of rapid warming. This project builds upon the recent discovery that a wide variety of invertebrate taxonomic groups, including arthropods, molluscs, and echinoderms, are abundantly preserved in SBB sediments, and thus can be directly compared to more established records of climate change. The investigations of sedimentary communities will focus on three areas: 1) modern fauna, using recently collected box cores that span 300-1200m on the California margin, 2) a depth transect of cores from SBB spanning the deglaciation, the most abrupt climate change in recent geologic history, and 3) Mid-Pleistocene sediment records that have provided evidence of pervasive millennial-scale climate change throughout the past 1 Ma. A key to understanding the complexities of climate change impacts on ocean environments is the synthesis of biological, geological, chemical and physical information. This research will directly tackle that integration, and be combined with an effort to educate future math and science teachers and K-12 students by collaborating with the successful UC Davis Math and Science Teaching (MAST) program. Each year, MAST students will develop, test, and modify climate science curriculum during the fall, which will then be utilized for visiting classrooms the following spring. Summer Fellowships will provide full financial support for MAST students (2/year) to take summer intensive field courses at Bodega Marine Laboratory (BML) and complete independent research projects. At the completion of their MAST Fellowship, students will utilize their independent research projects and data as inspiration for the next round of MAST-student led curriculum development.