Collaborative Research: Mesozooplankton food webs in intermittent upwelling systems: An overlooked link in a productive ocean

本项目将研究北加利福尼亚海流中沿海浮游动物群落及其早期捕食行为。目的是了解这些捕食者-猎物相互作用在该地区不同季节的不同海洋环境中是如何变化的。这项研究将使用高分辨率成像系统和净样本来测量浮游动物群落在一系列环境参数（如温度、上升流的相对时间和强度）下的营养相互作用。相机提供了浮游生物多样性的精细丰度和空间分布的详细信息，而净样本将为饮食相关分析提供生物样本。本项目将培养本科生12人，研究生2人，博士后1人。研究小组将开发各种教育活动和产品，以便更广泛地接触公众。该项目的浮游生物图像将用于建立全球浮游生物图像库，这是一个开放存取的浮游生物图像存储库，将成为研究界的资源。研究人员将扩大浮游生物门户网站的可用图像，这是一个他们与公民科学联盟的Zooniverse合作开发的公共网站，邀请公民科学家参与从野外照片中分类浮游生物。他们将与科学教育专家合作，在俄勒冈州立大学哈特菲尔德海洋科学中心（HMSC）游客中心的一个新的公共展览中包括浮游生物门户亭，该中心每年接待15万名各个年龄段的游客。重要的是，这项活动不仅将教育K-12及以上，而且将使研究人员能够研究激励公民科学家的因素，“重度用户”的特征，以及如何支持和鼓励这些用户成为高级合作者角色。作为新的“海上艺术家”项目的一部分，一位多媒体艺术家将加入研究游轮。他们的作品将在HMSC游客中心和俄勒冈大学查尔斯顿海洋生物中心展出，并将在俄勒冈大都市地区和服务不足的社区进行大规模的巡回展览。东部边界洋流是地球上最具生产力的海洋生态系统之一，支持着全球渔业的很大一部分，然而，关于非甲壳类浮游动物在通过上升流食物网转移产量方面的作用，还有一些悬而未决的问题。本研究将回答与中浮游动物联系相关的食物网动态、碳生产来源以及不同陆架上升流系统对上层营养水平的影响等关键问题。目前，在主要东部边界洋流系统的过渡区域，不仅存在关于食物网如何运作的知识差距，而且越来越多的证据表明，这些系统正在发生变化。主要洋流的区域和全球变化，包括上升流的强度，以及已经发生并预计将继续发生的由温度引起的物种范围的纬度变化，将对物种之间的相互作用产生重大影响，从而对食物网产生重大影响。理解这些相互作用并预测未来的变化与科学、社会和经济高度相关。研究人员计划用高分辨率原位浮游鱼成像系统对俄勒冈中部（间歇性上升流）和加利福尼亚北部（连续上升流）的北加州洋流的冬季和夏季进行采样，以获得对中浮游动物群落的准确描述：它们的丰度，水平和垂直空间分布，对比上升流/下升流系统动力学。与此同时，他们计划收集深度离散的中浮游动物样本，以量化幼鱼的季节性饮食和胶质浮游动物以及幼鱼的猎物特异性生长速度。对中浮游动物捕食者和猎物的稳定同位素分析将揭示新生产与再生生产在维持食物网中的相对作用，如主要的东部边界流。

This project will examine the coastal ocean mesozooplankton community and their predation by early life stages of fish in the northern California Current. The goal is to understand how these predator-prey interactions change during different oceanographic regimes that vary seasonally in the region. This study will use a very high-resolution imaging system coupled with net samples to measure trophic interactions within the zooplankton community across a range of environmental parameters (e.g., temperature, relative timing and intensity of upwelling). The camera provides detailed information on the fine-scale abundance and spatial distributions of a wide diversity of plankton, while the net samples will provide biological samples for diet-related analyses. This project will train 12 undergraduate and two graduate students and one post-doctoral scholar. The research team will develop a variety of educational activities and products to facilitate greater outreach to public audiences. Plankton imagery from this project will be used to build the Global Plankton Imagery Library, an open-access repository for plankton imagery that will be a resource for the research community. The researchers will expand the imagery available in the Plankton Portal, a public website they developed in partnership with the Citizen Science Alliance's Zooniverse, that invites citizen scientists to participate in classifying plankton from field photographs. They will collaborate with Science Education specialists to include Plankton Portal kiosks in a new public exhibit at the Oregon State University's Hatfield Marine Science Center (HMSC) Visitor Center, which annually hosts 150,000 visitors of all ages. Importantly, this activity will not only educate K-12 and beyond, but will enable researchers to study what factors motivate citizen scientists, what characterizes "heavy-users", and how those users can be supported and encouraged into advanced collaborator roles. A multi-media artist will join the research cruises as part of the new Artist-At-Sea program. Their artwork will be displayed at the HMSC Visitor Center and University of Oregon's Charleston Marine Life Center and a scaled traveling show will tour Oregon metropolitan areas and underserved communities.Eastern boundary currents are among the most productive marine ecosystems on the planet and support a significant proportion of global fisheries, yet there are unanswered questions about the role of non-crustacean zooplankton in transferring production through upwelling food webs. This study will answer key questions about the food web dynamics associated with mesozooplankton linkages, sources of carbon production, and consequences for upper trophic levels in different shelf upwelling systems. Not only is there a knowledge gap in how the food web currently functions in transition areas of major eastern boundary current systems, but there is increasing evidence that these systems are changing. Regional and global shifts in major currents, including upwelling strength, together with temperature-induced latitudinal shifts in species ranges that are already occurring and predicted to continue will have major effects on interactions among species, and consequently, food webs. Understanding these interactions and predicting future changes is highly relevant to science, society, and economies. The researchers plan to sample the winter and summer seasons in the northern California Current off central Oregon (intermittent upwelling) and northern California (continuous upwelling) with the high resolution In Situ Ichthyoplankton Imaging System to obtain an accurate description of mesozooplankton communities: their abundances, and horizontal and vertical spatial distributions, over contrasting upwelling/downwelling system dynamics. In parallel, they plan to collect depth-discrete mesozooplankton samples to quantify seasonal diets for larval fishes and gelatinous zooplankton and prey-specific growth rates of larval fishes. Stable isotope analysis of mesozooplankton predators and prey will reveal the relative role of new vs. regenerated production in sustaining food webs such major eastern boundary currents.