OCE-PRF: Do wildfires drive phytoplankton blooms in the California Current System?

在过去的50年里，美国西海岸的野火发生的频率和空间范围都大幅增加。火灾的结果是，大量的火山灰、黑碳和其他气雾剂被注入大气，并被从通常降落在海洋表面的燃烧区域运走。尽管地理上靠近大火，但人们对这些生物质燃烧的副产品沉积如何影响加州洋流系统(CCS)附近的海洋生态系统知之甚少。该项目将使用卫星、现场和历史数据，以及2-D理想化和3-D逼真建模进行调查。如果野火确实导致了CCS的水华，可能会对地下缺氧和酸化产生影响，这可能会反馈到更高的营养水平。该项目提出的努力将有助于更好地了解陆地-海洋系统之间的反馈，这可进一步用于向气专委评估未来气候强迫对CCS和其他有大型野火的沿海系统的影响。这项工作可能对海洋保护区的长期管理也很重要。少年派是第一代大学生和有色人种女性，她将在海洋科学界充当可见的榜样，指导加州大学洛杉矶分校的本科生和研究生研究人员，参与客座讲座和教学，帮助留住历史上被边缘化群体的学生，并参加当地的外联活动，与社区和加州大学西摩海洋发现中心有抱负的年轻科学家接触。该项目的一个主要假设是，由于营养和铁肥的作用，火山灰沉积的一阶效应推动了强大的浮游植物大量繁殖。目标是：(1)确定CCS中野火诱导水华的存在，(2)通过模式中的灰烬沉积来参数化野火强迫，以及(3)提供对生态系统响应的机械理解。在加州大学圣克鲁斯分校的导师克里斯托弗·爱德华兹博士的帮助下，该项目将使用大气和海洋观测数据集的组合，首先确定观察到的生物质燃烧对海洋生态系统的影响。为了进一步了解观测工作的结果，理想化的2D模型将被用来创建一个新的野火参数，以了解生态系统的反应。最后，将使用高分辨率3D模型在现实框架内调查2017/2018年野火季节。总体而言，该项目将提供量化评估和简单的理论来解释生态系统对生物质燃烧的反应。这一奖项反映了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。

The frequency and spatial extent of wildfires along the US West Coast has substantially increased over the last fifty years. As a consequence of fire, large plumes of ash, black carbon, and other aerosols are injected into the atmosphere and transported away from burn areas where they often land on the surface of the ocean. Despite the geographical proximity to large fires, there is little understanding of how the deposition of these byproducts of biomass burning affects the nearby marine ecosystem in the California Current System (CCS). This project would investigate, using satellite, in-situ and historical data, and 2-D idealized and 3-D realistic modeling. If wildfires indeed induce blooms in the CCS, there are likely impacts on subsurface hypoxia and acidification, which can feed back into higher trophic levels. The efforts proposed in this project will facilitate improved understanding of the feedbacks between the terrestrial-ocean system, which can further be used to inform IPCC assessments of the impacts of future climate forcing on the CCS and other coastal systems with large wildfires. This work may additionally be important for the long-term management of marine protected areas. The PI is a first-generation college student and a woman of color, who will serve as a visible role model within the ocean sciences community, mentor undergraduate students and graduate researchers at UCSC, engage in guest lecturing and teaching, to help promote the retention of students from historically marginalized groups, and participate in local outreach events to engage with the community and aspiring young scientists at UCSC's Seymour Marine Discovery Center.A major hypothesis in this project is that the first order effects from ash deposition drive strong phytoplankton blooms as a consequence of nutrient and iron fertilization. Goals are to: (1) identify the presence of wildfire induced blooms in the CCS, (2) parameterize wildfire forcing through ash deposition in models, and (3) provide a mechanistic understanding of ecosystem responses. With mentor Dr. Christopher Edwards at the University of California – Santa Cruz, the project would use a combination of atmospheric and oceanic observational data sets to first identify the observed impact of biomass burning on the marine ecosystem. To further the results from the observational work, idealized 2D modeling will be used to create a new wildfire parameterization to understand ecosystem responses. Finally, high resolution 3D models will be used to investigate the 2017/2018 wildfire season in a realistic framework. Overall, the project will provide quantitative assessments and simple theories explaining the ecosystem responses to biomass burning.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.