Collaborative
Research:
Changing
Seasonality
of
the
Arctic: Alteration of Production Cycles and Trophic
Linkages
in Response to Changes in Sea Ice and UpperOcean
Physics
Funded
by
NSF
Office
of
Polar Programs
Jinlun
Zhang and Mike Steele (University of Washington)
Yvette H. Spitz (Oregon StateUniversity)
Carin J. Ashjian (Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)
Robert G. Campbell (University
of Rhode Island)
Significant
changes
in
the
arctic
environment
have been detected in
recent years. One of the most striking changes is the decline of arctic
sea
ice. A diminished
arctic ice cover may have a profound effect on all components of
the marine ecosystem. Despite the extreme polar conditions, the Arctic Ocean supports a complex pelagic food web
that includes
zooplankton, fish, birds, seals, walruses, whales and the top predator,
the
polar bear. At the base of the food chain, supporting all the marine
life, are
the phytoplankton and algae that produce organic carbon. The central
hypothesis of this collaborative research is that reduction
in
ice
cover
and the concomitant upper ocean physical changes
in
response to climate warming will substantially modify
and
impact the seasonality of the Arctic planktonic marine ecosystem by
altering the timing, magnitude, duration, and pattern of production
cycles, with effects including changes in primary
production, in utilization and cycling of organic carbon, in ecosystem
function, and in the relative proportions of biomass in the different
ecosystem
components. To address this overarching hypothesis, we plan to synthesize
model estimates and available field
observations retrospectively
and
predictively.
The
model
to
be
developed
is a coupled pan-Arctic Biology/Ice/Ocean Modeling and Assimilation
System (BIOMAS)
that
aims
at
an
integrated understanding of three components of the arctic
system:
sea ice, ocean, and the planktonic ecosystem.