Estuarine Ecosystem Adaptation Due to Environmental Variability and Watershed Restoration

这篇博士论文将研究生态恢复、海平面上升和环境变化对沿海生态系统食物网变化的综合影响。河口生产高产量的休闲和商业渔业，养活数十亿人并推动经济。许多大规模生态系统恢复努力的目标是淡水系统的变化，这些变化影响下游沿海水域的功能、生产力和生物多样性。同时，环境的多变性正在推动海平面、温度和降水的变化，这些变化正在影响这些相同河口系统的相同特征。这项研究开发的生态系统模型将帮助资源管理者和恢复实践者设计和规划沿海生态系统的有益结果，考虑到这些共同发生的变化驱动因素的复杂相互作用。对受环境变异性和大规模恢复努力共同影响的生态系统进行建模、预测和分析，将导致对这些大规模驱动因素的空间和时间上河口生态系统响应的新知识。该项目涉及以下问题：1)盐度范围和变异性、水深、温度和底层沉积物的变化将如何影响河口鱼类、无脊椎动物和海草的分布？2)由于水文恢复和环境变化的相互作用，未来的时空生态系统变化将如何影响河口的生产力、渔业上岸和食物网络结构？博士生将开发栖息地适宜性模型，以纳入学生先前校准和验证的空间生态系统模型，并通过开发空间显式和时间动态的食物网络模型来预测未来的河口动态。模拟的生态系统具有广泛的时空盐度变化，具有经济价值的休闲渔业、商业渔业的苗圃栖息地、扰乱的流域和水文状况、生态系统规模的恢复努力，并且容易受到无处不在的环境变化和海平面上升的威胁，这反映了全球系统的未来变化。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This doctoral dissertation will examine the combined influences of ecological restoration, sea-level rise, and environmental variability on changes in the food webs of coastal ecosystems. Estuaries produce highly productive recreational and commercial fisheries that feed billions and drive economies. Many large-scale ecosystem restoration efforts target changes in freshwater systems that impact the functioning, productivity, and biodiversity of downstream coastal waters. Simultaneously, environmental variability is driving changes in sea-level, temperature, and precipitation that are influencing the same characteristics of these same estuarine systems. The ecosystem model developed by this research will help resource managers and restoration practitioners design and plan for beneficial outcomes for coastal ecosystems given the complex interactions of these co-occurring drivers of change.Modeling, prediction, and analysis of ecosystems impacted by the coupled effects of environmental variability and large-scale restoration efforts will lead to new knowledge of spatial and temporal estuarine ecosystem responses to these large-scale drivers. The project addresses the following questions: 1) How will changes in salinity range and variability, water depth, temperature, and bottom sediments affect the distribution of fishes, invertebrates, and seagrass coverage in estuaries? 2) How will future spatial and temporal ecosystem changes, resulting from the interactions of hydrological restoration and environmental change, affect productivity, fisheries landings, and food web structure in estuaries? The doctoral student will develop habitat suitability models to incorporate into the student’s previously calibrated and validated aspatial ecosystem model and predict future estuarine dynamics with the development of a spatially explicit and temporally dynamic food web model. The modeled ecosystem has broad spatial and temporal salinity variation, has an economically valuable sport fishery, nursery habitat for commercial fisheries, disturbed watershed and hydrologic regime, ecosystem-scale restoration effort, and is vulnerable to the ubiquitous threat of environmental variability and sea-level rise that reflects future changes in systems worldwide.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.