RCN: Coastal Rainforest Margins Research Network - understanding materials flux in linked terrestrial and marine ecosystems in the face of climate change

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Coastal margins are dynamic zones at the interface between land and ocean, where fresh water and nutrients, like carbon, iron and nitrogen, flow downstream from coastal watersheds into the nearshore marine environment. The links between terrestrial and marine ecosystems are especially tight in the coastal temperate rainforests of Alaska and British Columbia. Abundant rainfall moves nutrients held in glaciers, dense forests, and wetlands to estuaries and fjords, supporting productive fisheries and robust marine mammal populations. This region includes the largest remaining old-growth forests in North America; has among the highest rates of glacier melt on the planet; supports billion-dollar fishing and tourism industries; and is home to tens of thousands of people who depend on natural resources for their livelihoods. Because the movement of fresh water and nutrients plays a key role in these linked ecosystems, climate-driven changes in this flow may impact coastal ecosystems and the human communities that depend on them. The Coastal Rainforest Margins Research Network is an international research collaborative that will facilitate a better understanding of these processes and impacts. This Network will establish a core community of scientists and stakeholders to function as an information and guidance resource for ecosystem management and community adaptation into the future. An improved understanding of this ecosystem will help build resilience in local communities and ecosystems in a warming and increasingly variable climate. Additionally, it will provide a foundation for understanding climate-driven changes within coastal temperate rainforests and coastal margins worldwide.The Coastal Rainforest Margins Research Network will be composed of research communities organized within key disciplines, including hydrology, forest ecology, soil science, biogeochemistry, and near-shore marine ecology. These disciplinary communities will address critical information gaps, develop regional collaborations, and synthesize knowledge regarding water, carbon, and nutrient fluxes in a landscape where intense transformations and rapid transfers between terrestrial and freshwater environments control the delivery of these materials to the coastal ocean. The Network will achieve these goals through three main activities: 1) structured information exchanges among Network participants, including regular teleconferences, research webinars, field site visits, web-hosted meetings, and annual multi-day workshops that bring the entire Network together; 2) creation of working groups to develop data collection, management and sharing protocols; and 3) development of outreach products useful to Network members as well as policy-makers and resource managers.