Collaborative Research: BoCP-Implementation: Quantifying the response of biodiverse freshwater ecosystems to abrupt and progressive environmental change

合作研究：BoCP-实施：量化生物多样性淡水生态系统对突然和渐进的环境变化的响应

• 批准号: 2325895
• 负责人: Jeffery Stone
• 金额: $ 33.82万
• 依托单位: Indiana State University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2024
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2024-01-01 至 2028-12-31
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2325895&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Collaborative; Research; BoCP; Implementation; Quantifying

Coastal freshwater ecosystems are well-known for being biologically diverse and they provide important services to humans worldwide. With continued global warming, these coastal systems are at risk of undergoing dramatic environmental changes associated with rising seas. Future sea-level rise scenarios suggest either a gradual or a rapid upland migration of marine waters, yet the response of freshwater systems to these novel environmental conditions is unknown. Establishing an understanding of how ecosystems respond to marine water inundation is difficult to constrain using only modern observations. The low-lying freshwater ecosystem in eastern Guatemala, which is made up of two interconnected lakes and several important wetlands (known as the Izabal/Golfete system), has undergone two significant environmental changes during the recent past, one associated with a rapid and a second with a gradual inundation by marine waters. These two historical natural experiments provide an unparalleled opportunity to investigate how the Izabal/Golfete system responded to different degrees of environmental stress. This project will constrain these changes using sedimentological, geochemical, biological, and genetic methods. We aim to reveal how the environment and biota responded to these two scenarios of marine water inundation, providing crucial information to assess how this and other at-risk ecosystems will respond to future sea-level rise. We aim to provide essential data for managers and entities to safeguard these important biological hotspots, establish strong international relationships, and engage with local communities and governmental and educational institutions in the US and Guatemala. Future sea-level rise models suggest that marine flooding of coastal freshwater ecosystems will increase in frequency, yet the response of these biologically-diverse systems to different degrees of marine inundation is unknown. This project will use the Izabal/Golfete system, a freshwater ecosystem in eastern Guatemala, to assess how variations in marine inundation affected the environment and its functional diversity. Our study is therefore in an unrivaled position to make contributions to our understanding of how ecosystems function and respond to marine flooding events. We will do this by collecting sediment cores, surface sediment, fish, and water samples and generate high-resolution time series of environmental and biological changes using sedimentological, inorganic and organic geochemical, micropaleontological, and genetic data. The combination of datasets will allow us to model functional diversity through temporally different environmental stressors and transitions, allowing us to understand and forecast the response of freshwater ecosystems to marine inundation events. Finally, the highly integrative, multi-institution, and international nature of this project will be of significant benefit to the participating students, will allow us to establish several outreach programs in US and Guatemalan schools and museums, and will provide a foundation for understanding the impacts of potential change to the regional system in eastern Guatemala and other similar 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.

沿海淡水生态系统以其生物多样性而闻名，它们为全世界的人类提供了重要的服务。随着全球持续变暖，这些沿海系统面临着与海平面上升相关的剧烈环境变化的风险。未来海平面上升的情景表明，海水将逐渐或迅速向高地迁移，但淡水系统对这些新环境条件的反应尚不清楚。仅仅利用现代观测很难理解生态系统对海水淹没的反应。危地马拉东部低洼的淡水生态系统由两个相互连接的湖泊和几个重要的湿地（称为Izabal/Golfete系统）组成，在最近的过去经历了两次重大的环境变化，一次与海水迅速淹没有关，另一次与海水逐渐淹没有关。这两个历史性的自然实验为研究Izabal/Golfete系统如何应对不同程度的环境压力提供了无与伦比的机会。该项目将利用沉积学、地球化学、生物学和遗传学等方法来限制这些变化。我们的目标是揭示环境和生物群对这两种海水淹没情景的反应，为评估这种和其他处于危险中的生态系统将如何应对未来海平面上升提供关键信息。我们的目标是为管理者和实体提供必要的数据，以保护这些重要的生物热点，建立牢固的国际关系，并与美国和危地马拉的当地社区、政府和教育机构建立联系。未来的海平面上升模型表明，沿海淡水生态系统的海洋洪水频率将增加，但这些生物多样性系统对不同程度的海洋洪水的反应是未知的。该项目将利用危地马拉东部的淡水生态系统Izabal/Golfete系统来评估海洋淹没的变化如何影响环境及其功能多样性。因此，我们的研究处于一个无与伦比的位置，可以为我们理解生态系统如何发挥作用并对海洋洪水事件做出反应做出贡献。为此，我们将收集沉积物岩心、地表沉积物、鱼类和水样，并利用沉积学、无机和有机地球化学、微古生物学和遗传数据生成高分辨率的环境和生物变化时间序列。数据集的组合将使我们能够通过时间上不同的环境压力和转变来模拟功能多样性，使我们能够理解和预测淡水生态系统对海洋淹没事件的反应。最后，这个项目的高度整合、多机构和国际性将为参与的学生带来巨大的好处，将使我们能够在美国和危地马拉的学校和博物馆建立几个外展项目，并将为了解危地马拉东部地区系统和世界其他类似系统的潜在变化的影响提供基础。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。