Collaborative Research: Investigating Holocene Shifts in the Diets and Paleohistory of Antarctic Krill Predators

合作研究：调查全新世南极磷虾捕食者饮食和古历史的变化

• 批准号: 1443386
• 负责人: Steven Emslie
• 金额: $ 42.46万
• 依托单位: University of North Carolina at Wilmington
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2015
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2015-08-15 至 2021-07-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1443386&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Collaborative; Research; Investigating; Holocene; Shifts

The Antarctic marine ecosystem is highly productive and supports a diverse range of ecologically and commercially important species. A key species in this ecosystem is Antarctic krill, which in addition to being commercially harvested, is the principle prey of a wide range of marine organisms including penguins, seals and whales. The aim of this study is to use penguins and other krill predators as sensitive indicators of past changes in the Antarctic marine food web resulting from climate variability and the historic harvesting of seals and whales by humans. Specifically this study will recover and analyze modern (20 year old), historic (20-200 year old) and ancient (200-10,000 year old) penguin and other krill predator tissues to track their past diets and population movements relative to shifts in climate and the availability of Antarctic krill. Understanding how krill predators were affected by these factors in the past will allow us to better understand how these predators, the krill they depend on, and the Antarctic marine ecosystem as a whole will respond to current challenges such as global climate change and an expanding commercial fishery for Antarctic krill. The project will further the NSF goals of training new generations of scientists and of making scientific discoveries available to the general public. This project will support the cross-institutional training of undergraduate and graduate students in advanced analytical techniques in the fields of ecology and biogeochemistry. In addition, this project includes educational outreach aimed encouraging participation in science careers by engaging K-12 students in scientific issues related to Antarctica, penguins, marine ecology, biogeochemistry, and global climate change.This research will help place recent ecological changes in the Southern Ocean into a larger historical context by examining decadal and millennial-scale shifts in the diets and population movements of Antarctic krill predators (penguins, seals, and squid) in concert with climate variability and commercial harvesting. This will be achieved by coupling advanced stable and radio isotope techniques, particularly compound-specific stable isotope analysis, with unprecedented access to modern, historical, and well-preserved paleo-archives of Antarctic predator tissues dating throughout the Holocene. This approach will allow the project to empirically test if observed shifts in Antarctic predator bulk tissue stable isotope values over the past millennia were caused by climate-driven shifts at the base of the food web in addition to, or rather than, shifts in predator diets due to a competitive release following the historic harvesting of krill eating whale and seals. In addition, this project will track the large-scale abandonment and reoccupation of penguin colonies around Antarctica in response to changes in climate and sea ice conditions over the past several millennia. These integrated field studies and laboratory analyses will provide new insights into the underlying mechanisms that influenced past shifts in the diets and population movements of charismatic krill predators such as penguins. This will allow for improved projections of the ecosystem consequences of future climate change and anthropogenic harvesting scenarios in the Antarctica that are likely to affect the availability of Antarctic krill.

南极海洋生态系统具有很高的生产力，并支持各种各样的生态和商业重要物种。 该生态系统中的一个关键物种是南极磷虾，除了商业收获外，它是包括企鹅，海豹和鲸鱼在内的各种海洋生物的主要猎物。 这项研究的目的是将企鹅和其他磷虾捕食者用作敏感的指标，这是由于气候变化以及人类对海豹和鲸鱼的历史收获而导致的南极海洋食品网的过去变化。具体而言，这项研究将恢复和分析现代（20岁），历史悠久（20-200岁）和古代（200-10,000岁）企鹅和其他磷虾捕食者组织，以跟踪其过去的饮食和人口运动，相对于气候变化以及南极磷虾的可用性。了解过去如何受到这些因素的影响，将使我们能够更好地了解这些捕食者，它们所依赖的磷虾以及整个南极海洋生态系统如何应对当前的挑战，例如全球气候变化以及南极磷虾的不断扩展的商业渔业。 该项目将进一步培训新一代科学家的目标，并为公众提供科学发现。该项目将支持生态和生物地球化学领域的高级分析技术的本科生和研究生的跨机构培训。 此外，该项目还包括教育宣传活动，旨在通过使K-12学生参与与南极，企鹅，海洋生态学，生物地球化学和全球气候变化有关的科学问题来鼓励参与科学职业。这项研究将帮助将南方的最新生态变化置于更大的历史环境中，通过研究decadal和千禧年的人口群体的养分群体和千禧年的人群（野生狂热）的群体，并将密封和鱿鱼与气候变化和商业收获一致。 这将通过耦合先进的稳定和无线电同位素技术，尤其是特定于复合的同位素分析，并在整个全新世整个南极捕食者组织的现代，历史和保存良好的古构造中前所未有的访问。 这种方法将使该项目能够经验测试是否在过去的几千年中观察到的南极捕食者体积组织稳定的同位素值是由食物网基底部的气候驱动的转移引起的，除了在捕食者饮食饮食饮食中的变化之外，由于具有竞争力释放而导致捕食者饮食的变化，这是竞争性的罐装释放后的历史性释放，而磷虾饮食和密封厂的历史性收获后有竞争力。此外，该项目将跟踪南极周围企鹅殖民地的大规模遗弃和重新占领，以应对过去几千年中气候和海冰状况的变化。这些综合的现场研究和实验室分析将提供有关影响过去的饮食和人口运动的转变（例如企鹅等人的饮食和人口运动）的新见解。这将允许改善南极未来气候变化和人为收获场景的生态系统后果的预测，这可能会影响南极磷虾的可用性。