Topic Area: Microbiology and Molecular Ecology
Co-convenors: Uta Passow, Philip Boyd, David Hutchins
Description:
Our changing climate is modifying concurrently many oceanic properties which are biologically influential. Assessing the cumulative effects of each of these changes on marine biota poses a grand challenge to ocean scientists for several reasons. First, for microbes and phytoplankton up to six influential, environmental properties are being simultaneously changed. Second, it is being increasingly shown, that there are often subtle interactions between these drivers, and that these interactive affects are frequently non-additive. As a result, the response to simultaneous stresses can’t be predicted from response patterns of each one individually. Third, the effects of ocean global change can be further modified by local and regional drivers. The wide range of environmental permutations requires careful experimental design to distinguish responses to individual versus interactive stresses. In this session we solicit presentations on conceptual and numerical modelling, novel experimental approaches and manipulation studies that target physiology, omics, microevolution and community responses to multiple perturbations.
