Collaborative Research: Understanding Environmental and Ecological Controls on Carbon Export and Flux Attenuation near Bermuda

该奖项支持的研究将量化碳进入百慕大大西洋时间序列站点（BATS）中层带（200 - 1000米深度）的运输和碳在其中的命运。BATS的化学、生物和物理测量将与一个机制模型相结合，该模型旨在确定有机碳向这些中间深度出口的关键控制。模型数据综合的首要目标是识别和理解对碳通量路径的控制。在这个项目中，将使用数据指导模型来比较颗粒下沉、溶解有机碳混合和生物体主动运输的相对重要性。更广泛的影响包括一个视频游戏，访问/来自一个特许学校，该学校为来自地球科学代表性不足的社区的学生提供服务，通过伍兹霍尔伙伴关系教育计划监督本科生，为一名研究生和一名博士后提供建议。两位pi都是职业生涯早期的女性科学家，其中一位来自海洋学中代表性不足的群体。构建、评价和利用一个能够吸收浮游动物和异养细菌在中远洋（200-1000 m）关键代谢和生理速率及储量的机械生物地球化学模型，以量化和比较浮游动物的颗粒沉降通量、溶解有机碳（DOC）混合通量和呼吸CO2、颗粒和DOC的主动输出通量。此外，有机碳在中上层的命运将通过比较细菌和浮游动物的呼吸来表征。对这些通量的相对大小进行表征，将有助于了解对出口途径的环境和生态控制，以及从真光带出口到该地点中层带的有机碳的最终命运。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 research supported by this award will quantify transport of Carbon into, and Carbon’s fate within, the mesopelagic zone (200 – 1000m depth) at the Bermuda Atlantic Time Series Site (BATS). Chemical, biological, and physical measurements at BATS will be combined with a mechanistic model designed to identify key controls on the export of organic carbon into these intermediate depths. The over-arching goal of the model-data synthesis is to identify and understand controls on the C-flux pathways . In this project, a data-guided model will be used to compare the relative importance of particle sinking, mixing of dissolved organic carbon, and active transport by organisms. Broader impacts include a video game, visits to/from a charter school which serves students from communities underrepresented in Geosciences, supervision of undergraduates via the Woods Hole Partnership Education Program, advising of one graduate student, and of one postdoc. Both PIs are female early-career scientists, one from a group underrepresented in Oceanography.A mechanistic biogeochemical model capable of assimilating key metabolic and physiological rates and stocks of zooplankton and heterotrophic bacteria in the mesopelagic zone (200-1000 m) will be constructed, evaluated, and utilized with the goal of quantifying and comparing fluxes of particle sinking, mixing of dissolved organic carbon (DOC), and active export, by diel vertical migration of zooplankton, of respiratory CO2, particles and DOC. In addition, the fate of organic carbon in the mesopelagic will be characterized by comparing bacterial versus zooplankton respiration. Characterization of the relative magnitudes of these fluxes will provide a view of environmental and ecological controls on export pathways and on the ultimate fate of organic carbon exported from the euphotic to the mesopelagic zone at this location.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.