Ocean Food web Patrol - Climate Effects: Reducing Targeted Uncertainties with an Integrated Network (OCEAN-CERTAIN)
Ardelan M.V., Sommer U., Thorpe R.B., Bailey J., Thingstad T.F., de Kok, J-L., Bizsel. K.C., Öztürk P., Marsi E., Bratbak G., Turner D., Hoffmann L., Besiktepe S., Chiggiato J., González H.E., Iriarte J.L, Vadstein O, Tiller R., Richards R.G., Salgado H., Engelen G. and Olsen Y.
Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Norway
The marine food web is at the centre of both the climate-related CO2 cycle and food production in the marine environment. It plays a key role in regulating the climate system and is highly sensitive to climate change and other stressors.
OCEAN-CERTAIN will investigate the impact of climatic and non climatic stressors on the food web (FW) and the associated biological pump (BP), and the important natural and socio-economic feedback mechanisms. OCEAN-CERTAIN will identify and quantify multi-stressor impacts and feedbacks and study how these alter the functionality and structure of the food web and efficiency of the biological pump in different bio-geographical regions, the Arctic, Patagonia and Mediterranean.
OCEAN-CERTAIN aims to reduce targeted uncertainties regarding the effects of climatic and non-climatic stressors on the structure and function of the marine FW and the associated BP. This will be achieved through an integrated effort from the natural, social and computer science domains, drawing upon the tools and methods of data mining, ecosystem modelling, mesocosm and laboratory experiments, field studies, artificial intelligence (in particular, literature-based knowledge discovery) stakeholder-oriented participatory modelling and game theory analysis. This integrated scientific effort will increase the basic knowledge on the feedback structure of the system, including human behaviour and management alternatives. The results will be used to design and test a user-friendly decision-support system to facilitate the communication between marine scientists, stakeholders and managers. The improved understanding of the system feedback behaviour is expected to add to the resilience and adaptability for climate change.