ETBC Collaborative Research: Feedbacks between nutrient enrichment and intertidal sediments: erosion, stabilization, and landscape evolution

三十多年来，人为的营养负荷对沿海生态系统的影响一直是科学家、沿海管理者和公众关注的主要问题。营养物质的富集会导致各种负面的生态系统后果，包括浮游植物华化的强度、持续时间和频率的增加、缺氧和缺氧事件、大型藻类华化的增加、鱼类和贝类栖息地的丧失、底栖生物多样性的减少以及大叶藻床的丧失。值得注意的是，关于潮间带的研究很少，关于营养物质富集对海岸景观的影响或生物地球化学循环的变化如何通过促进侵蚀、增生和海岸线演变来改变海岸线的研究也很少。本研究确定了人为营养物负荷对马萨诸塞州梅岛湿地滩地和盐沼的影响。将使用最先进的现场和实验室技术工作。各种野外参数的定量测量将被纳入耦合的数值模型中，该模型将被用作一种工具，用于检查在较长时间尺度和不同地点对景观和生态系统的影响。工作结果将具有通用性，并广泛适用于世界任何地方的浅海海岸景观。这项工作的更广泛影响包括为土地管理者提供重要的海岸侵蚀预测和湿地评估，整合研究和教育，培训大量本科生和博士后，以及支持一名早期职业研究人员。

For more than three decades, the impact of anthropogenic nutrient loading in coastal ecosystems has been a major concern of scientists, coastal managers, and the public. Nutrient enrichment leads to a variety of negative ecosystem consequences including increased intensity, duration, and frequency of phytoplankton blooms, hypoxic and anoxic events, increased macroalgae blooms, losses of fish and shellfish habitat, decreased benthic diversity, and loss of eelgrass beds. Remarkably, little work has been done in intertidal areas, and very few studies have addressed the effects of nutrient enrichment on the coastal landscape or how changes in biogeochemical cycles can modify the coastline by promoting erosion, accretion, and shoreline evolution. This research determines the impact of anthropogenic nutrient loading on tidal flats and salt marshes at the Plum Island LTER site, Massachusetts. State-of-the-art field and laboratory techniques work will be used. Quantitative measurements of a wide variety of field parameters will be incorporated into coupled numerical models that will be used as a tool for examining impacts to the landscape and ecosystem over longer-time scales and at different locations. Results of the work will be generalizable and widely applicable to shallow coastal landscapes anywhere in the world. Broader impacts of the work include providing important projections of coastal erosion and wetland assessments to land managers, integration of research and education, training of significant numbers of undergraduates and a postdoc, and support of an early career researcher.