LTER: Plum Island Ecosystems, the impact of changing landscapes and climate on interconnected coastal ecosystems

梅岛生态系统长期生态研究（PIE LTER）站点由一个与缅因湾相连的流域-沼泽-河口系统组成。PIE LTER的目标是促进我们对陆地-沼泽-河口-海洋耦合生态系统对三个关键驱动因素（气候、海平面和人类活动）变化的长期响应的预测性理解。这项研究揭示了沼泽是如何应对海平面上升以及控制沼泽和河口生态系统中的碳储存或蓝碳的。为了了解来自陆地的营养物质和碳是如何影响河口的，以及沼泽和河口是如何影响海洋的碳和营养收支的，研究人员正在测量从流域到海洋连续体的碳和营养流动。为了了解河口和沼泽生态系统的食物网是如何随着海平面上升和气温升高而变化的，研究人员正在测量关键物种丰度的变化，并使用示踪技术分析整个食物网。这些信息正在与地方、区域和联邦机构以及非营利组织的管理人员共享。在与麻省大学奥杜邦分校的合作下，调查人员正在开展一项名为“盐沼科学”的K-12校园项目，为10所学校的学生和教师提供体验式学习的机会。他们还与缅因湾研究所（Gulf of Maine Institute）合作。缅因湾研究所是一家非营利组织，为教师提供强化培训和持续支持，帮助他们发展以社区为基础的环境管理项目。PIE LTER围绕三个问题进行组织，这些问题建立在以前的发现基础上，并将长期研究与新的观察、实验和模型开发相结合。这三个问题的活动贯穿整个流域-沼泽-河口领域，以促进对长期数据和新观测的更广泛综合。第一个问题是：“土地利用、海平面上升（SLR）、气候和地貌的变化如何改变流域/河口系统中有机物质和营养物质的来源和命运？”为了回答这个问题，研究人员正在通过扩展观测和数值模拟相结合的方式，研究相关联的沿海系统如何影响河口产量和水质，以及沿海生态系统在调节向近岸海洋的碳和养分通量方面的作用。第二个问题，“食物网和能量流如何响应新的地貌配置、单反、气候变化和相关的河口反应？”正在通过一项新的综合努力来确定景观将能量转移到食物网的能力如何随着栖息地的变化而变化。这项工作结合了长期丰度数据、生态位大小的稳定同位素数据和景观特征映射，以模拟未来沼泽-河口配置的变化将如何改变能量流。鉴于沿海生态系统在支持近岸食物网方面的重要性，了解这种联系将如何随着气候、土地利用变化和单反而变化是至关重要的。最后，研究人员提出了一个问题：“什么样的内部反馈可能会加速、减缓甚至逆转新兴沼泽结构和碳、营养物质和能量命运的预测变化？”社会需要更多地了解内部反馈，随着海平面上升、系统变暖和流域投入持续变化，这些反馈可能会增加沼泽的恢复能力或损害沼泽的生存。通过新的合作，该团队还利用大规模的沼泽恢复来测试系统内反馈机制的假设。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The Plum Island Ecosystems Long Term Ecological Research (PIE LTER) site consists of a linked watershed-marsh-estuarine system connected to the Gulf of Maine. The goal of the PIE LTER is to advance our predictive understanding of the long-term response of coupled land-marsh-estuary-ocean ecosystems to changes in three key drivers: climate, sea level and human activities. This research sheds light on how marshes are responding to sea-level rise and controls on carbon storage, or blue carbon, in marsh and estuarine ecosystems. To understand how nutrients and carbon from land influence the estuary and how marshes and estuaries contribute to oceanic carbon and nutrient budgets, the investigators are measuring the flows of carbon and nutrients across the watershed-to-ocean continuum. To understand how estuarine and marsh ecosystem food webs are changing with sea level rise and warming temperatures, the investigators are measuring changes in abundance of key species and analyzing the entire food web using tracer techniques. This information is being shared with managers from local, regional and federal agencies, as well as non-profit orgainzations. In collaboration with Mass Audubon the investigators are running a K-12 Schoolyard program, “Salt Marsh Science”, which provides ten schools with experiential learning opportunities for students and teachers. They also work with the Gulf of Maine Institute (GOMI), a non-profit that provides intensive training and on-going support to teachers to help them develop environmental community-based stewardship projects. The PIE LTER is organized around three questions that build on previous findings and integrate long-term studies with new observations, experiments, and model development. Activities within the three questions integrate across the entire watershed-marsh-estuary domain to facilitate a broader synthesis of long-term data and new observations. The first question is: “How are the sources and fates of organic matter and nutrients in the linked watershed/estuary system being altered by changing land use, sea-level rise (SLR), climate, and geomorphology?” To answer this, the investigators are examining how the linked coastal system influences estuarine production and water quality, as well as the role of coastal ecosystems in modulating carbon and nutrient fluxes to the nearshore ocean through a combination of expanded observations and numerical modeling. The second question, “How do food webs and energy flow respond to new geomorphic configurations, SLR, changing climate, and associated estuarine responses?” is being answered through a new integrative effort to determine how the landscapes’ ability to transfer energy to food webs changes with habitat. This effort is combining long-term abundance data, stable isotope data on niche size, and mapping of landscape features to model how future changes in the marsh-estuary configuration will modify energy flow. Given the importance of coastal ecosystems in supporting nearshore food webs, understanding how this link will change with climate, land use change, and SLR is critical. Finally, the investigators are asking: “What internal feedbacks might accelerate, slow down, or even reverse the predicted changes in emergent marsh configuration and the fate of carbon, nutrients and energy?” Society needs to understand more about internal feedbacks that might increase marsh resilience or compromise marsh survival as sea levels rise, systems warm, and watershed inputs continue to change. With new collaborations, the team is also leveraging large-scale marsh restoration to test hypotheses on feedback mechanisms within the system.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.