Modeling Life in the Future Ocean

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The Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change (IPCC) has sparked the development of an ensemble of global models to analyze how climate change impacts our environment. The focus of this has been on environmental parameters (temperature, pH, etc.) while there up to now has been but little research on how climate change may impact life on earth at the global scale. For terrestrial systems this has been followed up with models for how climate change combined with land use patterns may be impacting future global biodiversity, but similar analysis for the oceans are still wanting. The oceans supply us with seafood, among many other services, and there have been serious declines in fish populations over the last century due to overexploitation. As a result, the oceans now supply less seafood than they did in the peak fish years around 1980 even though fishing capacity has continued to increase globally. We fish more, but catch less. Adding to the problem is that the productivity of the world ocean may become seriously impacted by climate change. The few existing predictions point to widespread redistributions of fish species, generally in polar directions, and that overall productivity will decline, especially in the tropic. These projections are based on modeling with mainly physiological constraints but with no considerations for how ecological interactions, top-down and bottom-up forces impact seafood production. In essence, it is not clear how the redistributions of predator and prey species will impact their productivity, nor is the potential impacts of management interactions or changes in ocean productivity patterns. We have learned though from regional ecosystem studies that to replicate population trends over time we have to consider all of these factors in concert; hence they should also be considered for modeling at the global level. It is the intention through this Discovery Grant to develop and apply an ecosystem model of the global ocean that considers environmental productivity, food web and fisheries effects, and to test alternative hypotheses for key ecological and modeling processes. The global model is designed to provide plausible predictions for how future seafood production may be impacted by climate change and of the likelihood that alternative mitigation measures may be successful. The underlying theme for the research is to address the question: Will there be seafood and a healthy ocean for future generations to enjoy?