Research priorities in the adaptation of ecological networks to climate change

Fred Buchholz, Biologische Anstalt Helgoland – AWI, Marine Station, 27498 Helgoland, Germany, fbuchholz@awi-bremerhaven.de

The UN- Earth Summit, at Rio de Janeiro in 1992, decided on the Agenda 21 which centred on major environmental issues and defined the biodiversity crisis. The Rio convention helped in focusing already existing initiatives to establish an observational system of biodiversity and ecological change in the marine, particularly coastal environments of Europe. Marine research stations were considered as Observatories of the Seas and the network of European Marine Research Stations -MARS- was inaugurated in Paris in 1996 incorporating 56 stations from Svalbard to the Canaries and from the Azores to Cyprus. Since then it became well established that the seas are warming globally at a drastic pace. Clear effects are seen both in the plankton and benthos, particularly in invasions of warm adapted organisms - via propagules - to Northern waters. In fact, whole species communities have been experiencing a northward shift. The composition of functional communities in the food webs in pelagic and benthic systems is affected causing impacts on the productivity of the seas. From a geophysical standpoint discussion is still under way in how far a natural warming trend is superimposed by the green house effect. Nevertheless, both mitigation of deleterious influences of the warming trend and the prognosis of rates and effects of change in marine ecosystems have been defined as major research issues on a global scale. The MARS network helped to establish an EEC sponsored concerted action of marine stations BIOMARE and currently a Network of Excellence, MarBEF, Marine Biodiversity and Ecosystem Functions. The latter co-ordinates European research along three topics centred at biodiversity: Patterns, based strongly on long-term oceanographic observation series; Functions, with a footing on excellent experimental facilities at research stations e.g. for scenario testing; and Socio-Economics as the link between ecological research and management. Basically, such a threefold approach may be taken as a template to adapt and integrate biodiversity research on a broader scale. To compare effects of climate change latitudinally, the observation series are most valuable, but a better integration of data sets is still necessary, including further data mining and management. In parallel, experiments with single species in the laboratory and/or communities in the field will allow conclusions towards the organisms’ adaptive capacity in response to thermal and trophic changes. Physiological methodology in particular will help to define limits of adaptation and thus the future persistence of species in a particular area. Molecular genetic tools have become standard by now – however, the interfacing with traditional taxonomy has still to be advanced to be able to detect and understand hidden diversity or simply to better define the species concept. Such tools have become invaluable in microbial ecology as well – the study of functions of viruses and bacteria in regulating food web dynamics is still a wide-open field. A fast developing field is ecological modelling from simple conceptual models over individual based models to ecosystem modelling. There is great need for proper parameterization, based on experiments and hypothesis testing by way of field observations, to gauge the prognostic capacity – which has to be the basis of ecosystem management.

Conclusion:
Ecological networks are developing from asking the questions what and where? to how and why? aiming to understand changes in food web dynamics and to enhance predictive capacity in order to support ecological management.

Links and Literature:
www. Marsnetwork.org
www. MarBEF.org
Warwick R.M., Emblow C., Féral J.P., Hummel H., van Avesaath P., Heip C. 2003. European Marine Biodiversity Research Sites. BIOMARE Implementation and networking of large-scale long-term marine biodiversity in Europe. EU, NIOEO-CEME, Netherlands.