LTER: The Ecology of Row Crop Ecosystems and Landscapes at the KBS LTER Site

农业是人类直接管理的主要土地利用方式，是全球变化的最大推动者之一，对人类福祉和环境产生深远影响。应用生态知识来改善可持续农业生态系统仍然是环境科学公认的巨大挑战。 自 1988 年以来，W.K.凯洛格生物站 (KBS) LTER 致力于了解行间作物生态系统和景观的这一挑战，寻求了解这些高度管理的生态系统的基本生态基础，并揭示生态知识如何增强农业生产的长期可持续性。该续奖以过去的工作为基础，旨在更好地了解农业提供的关键生态系统服务的长期稳定性，重点关注三个主要驱动因素：气候变化、作物生产土地管理科学的变化以及入侵物种。 拟议的研究直接关系到从地方到全球范围内的农业和环境管理和政策。农业系统的研究也为生态学提供了信息，因为很少有其他生态系统能够对主要环境驱动因素进行如此程度的简化和控制。 培训研究生和博士后是该项目的重要组成部分，为本科生提供研究经验也是如此。 KBS 科学家还将通过与附近 11 个学区建立的合作伙伴关系，继续与 K-12 科学教师合作。外展和推广活动将覆盖广泛的利益相关者群体，并将包括对农民和影响农民决策的人的新重视。KBS LTER 的主要科学重点是耕作系统对变化驱动因素的脆弱性和恢复力，以及生态理论如何帮助设计更可持续的作物生产。 两个首要问题推动了这项研究：1）不断变化的环境驱动因素如何影响关键生态系统服务的恢复力，包括作物产量和盈利能力以及环境和社会生态效益，以及2）生态知识在多大程度上可以帮助维持这些服务的稳健和可靠的提供？ 关键的生态系统服务包括作物产量，但也更广泛地延伸到气候稳定（温室气体排放）、水质（富营养化）、害虫抑制（昆虫食草和捕食）和土壤肥力（植物-微生物-土壤相互作用）。 迄今为止的研究发现的知识差距将通过新的研究路线来解决，这些新的研究路线包括降雨操纵实验、流域观测、植物-微生物关联的快速进化检查、入侵物种和新型农药新影响的捕食者-猎物动态以及农民态度和行为的长期变化。

Agriculture is the dominant land use under direct management by people, and it is one of the biggest agents of global change, with far-reaching impacts on human welfare and the environment. The application of ecological knowledge to improve sustainable agricultural ecosystems remains a recognized grand challenge for environmental science. Since 1988, research at the W.K. Kellogg Biological Station (KBS) LTER has addressed this challenge for row-crop ecosystems and landscapes, by seeking to understand the fundamental ecological underpinnings of these highly managed ecosystems and to reveal ways that ecological knowledge can enhance the long-term sustainability of production agriculture. This renewal award builds on past work to launch an effort to better understand the long-term stability of key ecosystem services afforded by agriculture, with an emphasis on three major drivers: climate change, changes in the science of land management for crop production, and invasive species. Proposed research bears directly on agricultural and environmental management and policies at scales ranging from local to global. The study of agricultural systems also informs ecology because few other ecosystems have such a degree of simplification and control of major environmental drivers. Training graduate students and postdocs is an important component of this project, as is providing research experiences for undergraduates. KBS scientists also will continue to work with K-12 science teachers through an established partnership with 11 nearby school districts. Outreach and extension activities will reach a broad community of stakeholders, and will include a new emphasis on farmers and those who influence farmer decisions.The major scientific foci of the KBS LTER are vulnerability and resilience of cropping systems to drivers of change, and how ecological theory can help design more sustainable crop production. Two overarching questions motivate the research: 1) How do changing environmental drivers affect the resilience of key ecosystem services including crop yield and profitability as well as environmental and socioecological benefits, and 2) To what extent can ecological knowledge help maintain the robust and reliable delivery of these services? Key ecosystem services include crop yield but also extend more broadly to climate stabilization (greenhouse gas emissions), water quality (eutrophication), pest suppression (insect herbivory and predation), and soil fertility (plant-microbe-soil interactions). Knowledge gaps identified from research to date will be addressed with new research lines that include rainfall manipulation experiments, watershed observations, and examinations of rapid evolution of plant-microorganism associations, predator-prey dynamics newly influenced by invasive species and novel pesticides, and long-term changes in farmer attitudes and behaviors.