Functional Variability and Dynamics of Responses of Marine Forests to Global Change

海洋森林通常由海带目和褐藻目的海藻主导，是重要的蓝绿色基础设施。它们形成了全世界岩石海岸最具生产力和多样性的生态系统之一，并提供了重要的生态系统功能和服务(例如，食物、化学物质、气候调节、维护、旅游、科学和教育)，支撑着欧洲海岸的经济活动。受全球变化的影响，目前藻类森林的分布发生了变化，可能导致独特遗传资源的损失。东北大西洋的生物地理边界以及海藻的低分布潜力可能限制了连通性，从而降低了这些生态系统的长期适宜性。MARFOR项目旨在通过了解这一关键生态系统的功能和基因组多样性以及由此产生的实际和可能的未来适宜性来解释海洋森林的未来状况。主要目标包括：1.了解促进欧洲沿海藻类森林功能的关键物种的关键特征(适应、生态生理学、遗传生物多样性和连通性)。2.通过应用有关基因组生物多样性、动态和这些海洋群落的关键特征的知识，对全球变化的后果进行建模和预测。这将有助于确保海洋森林生态系统功能和生态系统服务的长期可持续性。协作项目小组具有突出的互补专业知识，并在地理上居住在相关的沿海地区。这导致了一种合格的伙伴关系和附加值，以最好地研究欧洲海岸物种和种群的生态、生态生理和基因组差异。为了实现这一点，我们将在不同的地点复制跨学科比较。这将得到一个大型公民科学倡议的支持，该倡议允许与公众和当地利益攸关方进行交流和参与。关于分布、生态生理学和特定物种温度特征的结果将使对当前和未来气候情景的预测成为可能。基于欧洲沿海的采样，我们将估计关键物种和元种群的遗传连通性和功能遗传多样性，这将在分布模型的背景下进行解释。这将有助于实施保护做法，评估种群的生存能力，为管理自然保护区和支持蓝色经济部门奠定基础。白皮书将协助利益攸关方在可持续发展的成本效益分析基础上执行健全的气候政策和战略。

Marine forests, typically dominated by kelps of the orders Laminariales and Fucales, represent important blue-green infrastructures. They form one of the most productive and diverse ecosystem along rocky coasts worldwide and provide important ecosystem functions and -services (e.g. food, chemical substances, climate regulation, maintenance, tourism, science and education) underpinning economic activities along European coasts. Influenced by global change currently there is a shift in distribution of algal forests, possibly leading to a loss of unique genetic resources. Biogeographic boundaries in the NE Atlantic along with a low distribution potential of kelps probably limit connectivity and thereby reduce long-term fitness of these ecosystems. Project MARFOR aims to explain the future condition of marine forests by understanding the functional and genomic diversity and the resulting actual and possible future fitness of this key ecosystem. Major goals include: 1. Understand critical traits (adaptation, ecophysiology, genetic biodiversity and connectivity) of key species that facilitate function of algal forests along European coasts. 2. Model and predict consequences of global change through application of knowledge on genomic biodiversity, dynamics, and critical traits of these marine communities. This shall help to ensure long-term sustainability of ecosystem function and ecosystem services of marine forests. Collaborating project teams have outstanding complementary expertise and geographically reside along relevant coastal areas. This leads to a qualified partnership and an added value to best study ecological, eco-physiological and genomic differences of species and populations along European coasts. To achieve this we will replicate interdisciplinary comparisons at different sites. This will be supported by a large citizen science initiative allowing communication with and participation of the public and local stakeholders. Results on distribution, ecophysiology and species-specific temperature traits will allow predictions for current and future climate scenarios. Based on sampling along European coasts we will estimate genetic connectivity and functional genetic diversity of key species and meta-populations which will be interpreted in the context of distribution models. This shall help to implement conservation practices, evaluate survival capacity of populations, lay the foundation to manage nature conservancy areas and support the blue economy sector. White papers will assist stakeholders in the implementation of sound climate policies and strategies based on a cost-benefit analysis for sustainable development.