Additional Participants

Partner Organizations

Georgia Tech University, Atlanta, GA
NOAA NMFS, Pacific Grove, CA

Project Period

September 1, 2010-August 31, 2014

Level of Access

Open-Access Report

Grant Number

4900 / 0815051

Submission Date

10-2-2014

Abstract

This is a Collaborative project POBEX (www.POBEX.org) under the the overall direction of M. DiLorenzo, GaTech. A separate FINAL report was submitted by DiLorenzo for the overall project in 2013. Using US and international observational datasets combined with physical and biological models, this project investigates the mechanisms of climate-related variability in three Pacific boundary ecosystems: Gulf of Alaska (GOA) and California Current System (CCS) referred to as the Northeast Pacific (NEP), the Humboldt or Peru-Chile Current System (PCCS), and the Kuroshio-Oyashio Extension (KOE) region. The research goals of this project can be summarized as follows:

(1) Assess to what extent, and by what mechanisms, large-scale climate modes (e.g. PDO, NPGO, ENSO, and potentially others) drove coherent changes across Pacific boundary ecosystems over the period 1960-2009.
(2) Quantify and explain how changes in regional ocean processes (e.g. upwelling, transport dynamics, mixing and mesoscale structure) at each boundary control phytoplankton and zooplankton dynamics. Then, use those results to test the degree to which changes in each study region intraseasonal oscillation, timing of spring transitions) during different phases of the-period climate modes (e.g. PDO, NPGO and others) determine the climate state of boundary-current ecosystems.
(3) Quantify the extent to which changes in the statistics of shorter-period events (e.g.intraseasonal oscillation, timing of spring transitions) during different phases of the longer-period climate modes (e.g. PDO, NPGO and others) determine the climate state of boundary-current ecosystems.
(4) Explore the range of uncertainties in the response of regional ocean dynamics and their ecosystems to climate change using forcing scenarios from selected climate model integrations that are part of the IPCC 2007 report.

This last objective begins an assessment of the potential impacts of climate change on regional ocean ecosystems, a topic poorly addressed in the latest IPCC report, but the chief instrument for most fisheries and coastal management. This report covers the final, no-cost extension year from efforts at the University of Maine.

Rights and Access Note

This Item is protected by copyright and/or related rights. You are free to use this Item in any way that is permitted by the copyright and related rights legislation that applies to your use. In addition, no permission is required from the rights-holder(s) for educational uses. For other uses, you need to obtain permission from the rights-holder(s).

Manuscript Number

MS584_2014_THO_Collaborative

Download

Share

 

Rights Statement

In Copyright - Educational Use Permitted.