Marine ecosystem response to multiple climatic and anthropogenic drivers: A modelling approach

摘要

Marine ecosystems are sensitive to the impacts of both climatic change and the direct effects of human activity. Predictive models that consider the full range of drivers (e.g. Climate and Ocean Acidification, Pollution, Fishing, Invasive Species) are required to elucidate the responses of the marine ecosystem in a holistic manner, rather than driver by driver as has been done in the past. One of the challenges is to integrate the response of ecosystems to multiple drivers across a range of trophic levels by developing coupled models to assess key vulnerabilities and risks of global change for the marine ecosystem. A focus for this work is MSFD which distinguishes 11 qualitative descriptors that together determine the characteristics of Good Environmental Status (GES). Underpinning this activity is the requirement for a range of scenarios which take account of the impacts of multiple climatic and anthropogenic drivers on marine ecosystems. Recently the FP7 MEECE has simulated present and future primary production states in several regions and this is being expanded to include simulations with coupled plankton fish models along with the effects of pollution and ocean acidification. Implementation of such models requires addressing challenges such as the choice of model structure, scaling processes from physiology to functional types to fish, the ecosystem model sensitivity to changes in the physical environment, new methods for the evaluation and comparison of ecosystem and biogeochemistry models and the quantification of simulation uncertainty. These points are illustrated with examples