Environmental Change Research Facility at BIOS

BIOS 环境变化研究机构

• 批准号: 1624380
• 负责人: Amy Maas
• 金额: $ 33.26万
• 依托单位: Bermuda Institute of Ocean Sciences (BIOS), Inc.
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2016
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2016-08-01 至 2018-07-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1624380&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Environmental; Change; Research; Facility; BIOS; Environmental; Change; Research; Facility; BIOS

The ocean ecosystem is a shared resource that provides food and oxygen while playing an important role in global cycles of carbon and nutrients. The oceans are, however, threatened by a number of human induced changes including increases in temperature, nutrients, CO2 and chemicals. In order to understand how the changing ocean environment influences the biology of marine organisms, scientists must run controlled experiments exploring the effects of many types of stressors, carefully quantifying their individual and combined effects. The Bermuda Institute of Ocean Sciences (BIOS; www.bios.edu ) - an independent U.S. not-for-profit organization and a Bermuda Registered Charity - is uniquely located on a seagrass and coral platform with easy access to the open ocean of the North Atlantic, providing the opportunity to perform manipulative experiments on a diverse array of organisms. A new Environmental Change Research Facility (ECRF) will be established at BIOS, initiating the capability for studies involving multiple environmental stressors associated with the effects of global climate change. This will consist of two environmental rooms, integrated into the pre-existing flow-through seawater, and CO2 exposure facilities that will allow for experiments at multiple temperatures. Many of the organisms of interest are small in size (i.e. juvenile coral through to bacteria), and many of the processes require specialized stains to visualize. Thus, the facility will also include a new microscope that will allow analyses at a broad range of sizes (petri dish to single cell) and that is capable of quantifying changes in organism development, calcification, and species composition. With the addition of both the environmental chambers and the microscope, the range of experiments that can be run at BIOS will be substantially expanded. BIOS hosts a large number of visiting scientists, and BIOS researchers participate in ongoing scientific collaborations with external scientists, many with NSF-supported research programs, such that the ECRF equipment will have a far reaching impact on the research capacity of the marine sciences community as a whole. The facility will also support the primary goal of the internships and courses at BIOS: to immerse students in experiential learning through research in the ocean sciences. This can be a seminal change for many students whose home institutions lack programs in marine science or the opportunity to conduct independent research. Education experiences at BIOS can influence decisions that determine STEM education and career trajectories, with students leaving our programs better prepared to pursue professional careers and/or graduate programs. The ECRF will provide opportunities to train undergraduate and graduate students in complex multi-stressor studies, fostering a next generation of scientists with the interdisciplinary skillset required to address the pressing questions of environmental change in the marine environment.One of the major objectives in modern biological oceanography is to understand how the myriad of co-occurring anthropogenic stressors influence marine organisms and determine how these will modify global biogeochemical cycles. The objective of this grant is to establish an Environmental Change Research Facility (ECRF) designed to test and quantify the effects of multiple anthropogenic stressors on the marine environment (including temperature, nutrients, CO2, low O2, and toxicants). Due to its unique location in the oligotrophic North Atlantic gyre, BIOS provides access to a broad array of marine systems, including open ocean, near-shore coral reef, seagrass and mangrove ecosystems. The accessibility of these biomes via BIOS?s fleet of research vessels is complimented by the presence of a flowing seawater laboratory and CO2 exposure system where manipulative experiments can be conducted. This grant supports the installation of two environmental rooms that, by providing both thermal stability for process studies and opportunities for controlled multi-stressor experiments, will substantially expand the types of research that could be pursued at BIOS by resident scientists, visiting researchers and students. Many of the organisms of interest ? planktonic zooplankton, calcifying foraminifera or algae, bacteria and viruses, and early-life stages of benthic organisms such as sea urchins and coral ? are quite small. In order to quantify and visualize the response of this wide size-range of organisms, the facility will also include a new microscope, capable of visualizing changes in organism development and calcification, as well as cell enumeration. This instrument will increase the in-house observational capabilities for both preserved and live imaging and provide the capacity to precisely control image positioning to allow for time lapse capture of growth, biomineralization and dissolution. With the addition of this instrumentation, scientists and visiting researchers will be in a position to address the pressing questions of how environmental parameters affect the function of marine organisms, including biomineralization, development, ageing, biogeochemical cycling, community composition, microevolution and subsequently ecosystem function and human health impacts. They ensure the continued success and growth of an already transformative program in microbial oceanography by expanding the capacity to execute and analyze process studies in a controlled environment. Paralleling the benefits to basic research, the ECRF facility will be available for use with student internships and BIOS courses. Since 2011, BIOS has hosted over 800 students annually, most of them from US institutions. The ECRF will provide opportunities to train undergraduate and graduate students to conduct and analyze complex multi-stressor studies, fostering a next generation of scientists with the interdisciplinary skillset required to address the pressing questions of environmental change.

海洋生态系统是一种共享资源，在全球碳和养分周期中发挥重要作用时，可提供食物和氧气。但是，海洋受到许多人类引起的变化的威胁，包括温度，营养素，二氧化碳和化学物质的升高。为了了解不断变化的海洋环境如何影响海洋生物的生物学，科学家必须进行受控的实验，以探索许多类型的压力源的影响，仔细量化其个体和联合效果。百慕大海洋科学研究所（BIOS； www.bios.edu） - 一个独立的美国非营利组织和百慕大注册的慈善机构 - 位于海草和珊瑚平台上，便于访问北大西洋的露天和珊瑚平台，提供了在有机体上进行多样性的机器人派实验的机会。 BIOS将建立一个新的环境变化研究机构（ECRF），为涉及与全球气候变化影响相关的多种环境压力源的研究启动能力。 这将由两个环境室组成，这些环境室集成到先前存在的流水海水中，以及二氧化碳暴露设施，这些设施将允许在多个温度下进行实验。许多感兴趣的生物的大小很小（即幼年珊瑚至细菌），许多过程需要专门的污渍才能可视化。因此，该设施还将包括一个新的显微镜，该显微镜将允许在各种尺寸（培养皿到单细胞）的分析中进行分析，并能够量化生物体发育，钙化和物种组成的变化。随着环境室和显微镜的添加，可以在BIOS上运行的实验范围将大大扩展。 BIOS主持了许多来访的科学家，BIOS研究人员与外部科学家进行了持续的科学合作，许多人与NSF支持的研究计划一起，因此ECRF设备将对整个海洋科学社区的研究能力产生很大的影响。该设施还将支持BIOS实习和课程的主要目标：通过海洋科学研究使学生沉浸于体验式学习。对于许多学生缺乏海洋科学计划或进行独立研究的机会的学生来说，这可能是一种开创性的变化。 BIOS的教育经验可以影响决定STEM教育和职业轨迹的决策，而学生离开我们的计划可以更好地从事职业职业和/或研究生课程。 The ECRF will provide opportunities to train undergraduate and graduate students in complex multi-stressor studies, fostering a next generation of scientists with the interdisciplinary skillset required to address the pressing questions of environmental change in the marine environment.One of the major objectives in modern biological oceanography is to understand how the myriad of co-occurring anthropogenic stressors influence marine organisms and determine how these will modify global biogeochemical周期。该赠款的目的是建立旨在测试和量化多种人为应激源对海洋环境（包括温度，营养素，二氧化碳，低O2和有毒物质）的影响的环境变化研究设施（ECRF）。由于其在贫困性北大西洋Gyre中的独特位置，BIOS提供了访问广泛的海洋系统的访问，包括开阔的海洋，近岸珊瑚礁，海草和红树林生态系统。这些生物群落通过BIOS的研究容器的可及性得到了流动的海水实验室和二氧化碳暴露系统的称赞，可以进行操纵实验。这项赠款支持安装两个环境室，通过为过程研究提供热稳定性，并为受控的多压力实验提供机会，将大大扩展常驻科学家，访问研究人员和学生可以在BIOS进行的研究类型。许多感兴趣的生物？浮游生物浮游生物，钙化有孔虫或藻类，细菌和病毒，以及底栖生物的早期阶段，例如海胆和珊瑚？很小。为了量化和可视化这种宽范围的生物的响应，该设施还将包括一个新的显微镜，能够可视化生物体发育和钙化的变化以及细胞枚举。该仪器将增加保留和实时成像的内部观察能力，并提供精确控制图像定位的能力，以允许捕获生长，生物矿化和溶解的时间衰减。随着这种仪器的增加，科学家和来访的研究人员将有能力解决环境参数如何影响海洋生物的功能的紧迫问题，包括生物矿化，发展，衰老，衰老，生物地球化学循环，社区组成，微观进化，微观进化和随后的生态系统功能和人类健康的影响。它们通过扩大在受控环境中执行和分析过程研究的能力来确保微生物海洋学中已经变革的计划的持续成功和增长。与基础研究的好处相关，ECRF设施将用于学生实习和BIOS课程。自2011年以来，BIOS每年接待了800多名学生，其中大多数来自美国机构。 ECRF将为培训本科和研究生进行培训的机会进行和分析复杂的多压力研究，从而培养下一代科学家，并使用跨学科的技能集来解决环境变化的紧迫问题。