In from the cold: how are winter plankton communities changing with the climate?

湖泊生态系统拥有不同的生物群落，在季节、年和年代际时间尺度上表现出很大的变化。越来越多的证据表明，这些群落已经受到气候变化的影响，但许多现有的研究都集中在春季和夏季群落的生态上，而冬季群落受到的关注较少。我们知道冬天变得越来越暖和，因此了解冬季群落是如何变化的很重要，因为这些变化可能会“延续”到随后的季节，并产生持久的影响。本项目以具有重要生态意义的湖泊浮游生物群落为研究重点，将通过以下方法解决这一知识缺口：1)回顾当前以冬季湖泊生态系统为重点的气候变化研究的最新进展；2)利用野外和大型室外实验系统的样本，对具有重要功能的浮游动物消费者的丰度、多样性和大小结构进行显微和图像分析。3)利用国际合作提供的湖泊网络数据，将这些分析扩展到全球范围。4)利用稳定同位素分析，有针对性地研究冬季浮游食物网结构特征对环境变化的响应。您将与位于兰开斯特环境中心内的英国生态与水文中心和兰开斯特大学的专家团队合作。实地考察将在英格兰湖区进行；联合国教科文组织世界遗产在项目期间，你将成为长期数据分析、生物样本图像分析和稳定同位素分析方面的专家，并有机会与其他研究人员和更广泛的公众交流你的科学

Lake ecosystems host diverse communities of organisms which show great variation over seasonal, year-to-year and decadal timescales. Growing evidence demonstrates that these communities are already being impacted by climate change, but much existing research has focused on the ecology of spring and summer communities, with winter communities receiving less attention. We know that winters are becoming milder and so it is important to understand how winter communities are changing, as these changes may "carry over" into subsequent seasons and have lasting effects. Focusing on ecologically-important lake plankton communities, this project will address this knowledge gap, combining:1) Review of the current state-of-the-art in climate change research focused on lake ecosystems in winter2) Combined microscopic and image analysis of the abundance, diversity and size structure of functionally-important zooplankton consumers using samples from the field and large outdoor experimental systems.3) Extending these analyses to a global extent using data from a network of lakes, provided through international collaboration.4) Targeted investigation, using stable isotope analysis, of changing structural properties of winter planktonic food webs in response to environmental change.You will work with a team of experts based at the UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology and Lancaster University, co-located within the Lancaster Environment Centre. Fieldwork will be conducted in the English Lake District; a UNESCO World Heritage Site. During the project you will become expert in the analysis of long-term data, image analysis of biological samples, and stable isotope analysis, with opportunities to communicate your science to other researchers and the wider public