Grant history of an LTER site
Coral reefs are of great ecological importance, having the highest species diversity of any marine habitat and ranking near the top of all ecosystems with respect to annual total gross productivity. The communities are supported structurally by reef-building corals and trophically by efficient recycling. The key biotic interaction underlying reef systems is the mutualistic relationship… Read more »
Intellectual Merit: The Moorea Coral Reef (MCR) LTER is an interdisciplinary research and education program that was established in 2004, to explore the joint effects of climate and disturbance on the structure and function of coral reefs. The study area is the reef complex that surrounds the island of Moorea in French Polynesia. The initial… Read more »
Intellectual Merit: The Moorea Coral Reef (MCR) LTER was established in 2004 to investigate community and ecosystem effects of pulsed perturbations and slowly changing environment from local and global stressors. The site is the coral reef complex surrounding the island of Moorea, French Polynesia, which includes a lagoon system (with fringing reef and back reef… Read more »
Coral reefs have enormous ecological, economic and cultural value, but are threatened by natural disturbances and human activities including those causing global-scale changes. Worldwide, corals increasingly are being replaced by macroalgae or non-coral invertebrates. The reefs of Moorea, French Polynesia, provide an ideal model system to understand factors that mediate ecological resilience and to develop… Read more »
Coral reefs provide important benefits to society, from food to exceptional biodiversity to shoreline protection and recreation, but they are threatened by natural perturbations and human activities, including those causing global-scale changes. These pressures increasingly are causing coral reefs to undergo large, often abrupt, ecological changes where corals are being replaced by seaweeds or other… Read more »
While cities often conjure images of buildings, parking lots, and streets, they are also home to diverse kinds of nature, in parks, yards, gardens, lakes, streams, and the like. This diverse urban nature is important habitat for many types of plants and wildlife, and is affected by a variety of stressors, ranging from toxic pollutants,… Read more »
The northwest Atlantic is renowned for productive fisheries that depend upon a complex food web of planktonic organisms that provide them energy. In these waters — as in coastal waters around the globe — human activities, environmental variability, and decadal-scale change intersect to have diverse effects on the planktonic food web. It is crucial to… Read more »
The Northeast U.S. Shelf (NES) is the region of the Northwest Atlantic Ocean that overlies the continental shelf from North Carolina to Maine. The NES has a long history of intense human utilization and provides an array of ecosystem services including shipping, recreation, conservation, and energy development. The NES also comprises a seasonally dynamic and… Read more »
This award will establish a Long Term Ecological Research (LTER) program in the Northern Gulf of Alaska (NGA). The NGA is a highly productive subarctic biome where intense environmental variability has profound impacts on lower trophic level organisms and community dynamics that, directly or indirectly, support the iconic fish, crabs, seabirds and marine mammals of… Read more »
The Northern Gulf of Alaska (NGA) is a highly productive subarctic marine ecosystem, and diverse coastal communities have relied upon it for hundreds and thousands of years. Today, the NGA ecosystem continues to support national fisheries, local coastal communities, and Tribal governments in terms of food, culture, and economy. The NGA Long Term Ecological Research… Read more »
