COLLABORATIVE RESEARCH: Spatial and Temporal Influences of Thermokarst Features on Surface Processes in Arctic Landscapes

合作研究：热岩溶特征对北极景观地表过程的时空影响

• 批准号: 0806329
• 负责人: Edward Rastetter
• 金额: $ 11.62万
• 依托单位: Marine Biological Laboratory
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2008
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2008-09-01 至 2012-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0806329&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: COLLABORATIVE; RESEARCH; Spatial; Temporal; Influences

Recent summaries of international research clearly document the past and future extent of climate warming in the Arctic. These summaries suggest that in the future, rising temperatures will be accompanied by increased precipitation, mostly as rain: 20% more over the Arctic as a whole and up to 30% more in coastal areas during the winter and autumn. These climate changes will have important impacts on Arctic Systems. Of direct interest to this research is the likelihood that warming will promote permafrost degradation and thaw. Formerly frozen soils may be further destabilized by increased precipitation, leading to hillslope thermokarst failures. Recent work has documented that thermokarst failures are abundant and appear to have become more numerous around Toolik Lake on the eastern North Slope and in the western Noatak River basin in Alaska. A widespread and long-term increase in the incidence of thermokarst failures may have important impacts on the structure and function of arctic headwater landscapes. This research will use a systems approach to address hypotheses about how thermokarst failures influence the structure and function of the arctic landscape. It will focus on the composition of vegetation, the distribution and processing of soil nutrients, and exports of sediments and nutrients to stream and lake ecosystems. Results obtained at this hillslope scale will be linked to patterns observed at the landscape scale to test hypotheses about the spatial distribution of thermokarst failures in the arctic foothills. It is important to understand these interactions because perhaps the greatest potential impacts of changing land surface processes and formation of thermokarst failures are feedbacks to the climate system through energy, albedo, water, and trace gas exchange.This research is designed to quantify linkages among climatology, hillslope hydrology, geomorphology, geocryology, community ecology of vegetation, soil nutrient dynamics, microbial ecology, trace gas dynamics, and aquatic ecology. It will employ a combination of field experimentation, remote sensing, and simulation modeling as a means to quantify these relationships.

国际研究的最新摘要清楚地记录了北极气候变暖的过去和未来范围。这些摘要表明，将来，温度升高将伴随着降水量的增加，主要是降雨：在冬季和秋季，沿海地区的北极地区高20％，多达30％。这些气候变化将对北极系统产生重要影响。这项研究的直接兴趣是变暖会促进永久冻土降解和融化的可能性。以前的冷冻土壤可能会因降水增加而进一步稳定，从而导致山坡热力学故障。最近的工作记录了Thermokarst失败丰富，并且在东北坡和阿拉斯加西部Noatak河流盆地的Toolik Lake周围似乎变得越来越多。热力学故障发生率的广泛和长期增加可能会对北极雷神景观的结构和功能产生重要影响。这项研究将使用系统方法来解决有关热力学故障如何影响北极景观的结构和功能的假设。它将集中于植被的组成，土壤养分的分布和加工以及对溪流和湖泊生态系统的沉积物和养分的出口。在此山坡量表上获得的结果将与在景观量表上观察到的模式有关，以测试有关北极山麓丘陵中热力学故障的空间分布的假设。 It is important to understand these interactions because perhaps the greatest potential impacts of changing land surface processes and formation of thermokarst failures are feedbacks to the climate system through energy, albedo, water, and trace gas exchange.This research is designed to quantify linkages among climatology, hillslope hydrology, geomorphology, geocryology, community ecology of vegetation, soil nutrient dynamics, microbial ecology, trace gas dynamics, and aquatic生态学。它将采用现场实验，遥感和仿真建模的组合，作为量化这些关系的手段。