Collaborative Research: The physical and chemical dynamics of groundwater flow across the land-sea interface in Arctic lagoon ecosystems

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Coastal areas in the Arctic are changing rapidly, with increases in river flow, coastal erosion, and permafrost thaw, and as underground ice melts, thin, shallow aquifers develop. At the same time, the amount, organic and inorganic nutrient content, and pathways of coastal groundwater have been understudied and remain poorly understood in the Arctic. This study will combine field measurements and numerical modeling to characterize groundwater flow to Beaufort Sea lagoons and how it changes across seasons and years. The project will train undergraduate and graduate students, disseminate the knowledge gained to communities close to the study area and near the investigators’ institutions, including K-12 students and local agencies involved in managing the Arctic coast, create and broadcast content for public education, and provide data and tools to help understand fundamental processes in the Arctic. This project will provide fundamental new knowledge regarding groundwater flow and biogeochemical processes in lagoon systems along the Alaskan Beaufort Sea coast. The primary research objectives are: 1) to determine the mechanisms and pathways for groundwater flow across the land-lagoon interface and how these mechanisms and pathways evolve seasonally; and 2) to understand seasonally-varying fluxes, sources, and lability of groundwater-derived dissolved organic matter and inorganic nutrients delivered to lagoons along the eastern Alaskan Beaufort Sea coast. A suite of methods will include isotopic, biogeochemical, hydrologic, and geophysical field measurements of groundwater flow and solute transport across the land-lagoon interface during spring ice-break-up, later summer open water season, and until winter freeze up. The investigators will interpret the observations and develop physical insight using computation flow and transport modeling.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.