Methods and Applications for Assessing Ecosystem Impacts of Natural Climate Fluctuations and Human Activities with Emphasis on Western Canada

评估自然气候波动和人类活动对生态系统影响的方法和应用，重点是加拿大西部

• 批准号: RGPIN-2014-05486
• 负责人: Routledge, Rick
• 金额: $ 1.02万
• 依托单位: Simon Fraser University
• 依托单位国家: 加拿大
• 项目类别: Discovery Grants Program - Individual
• 财政年份: 2017
• 资助国家: 加拿大
• 起止时间: 2017-01-01 至 2018-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca/ase-oro/Details-Detailles_eng.asp?id=635844
• 关键词: Methods; Applications; Assessing; Ecosystem; Impacts

My recent research has generated (i) fundamental insight on ecosystem interactions associated with pressing conservation concerns, and (ii) a valuable statistical tool for use in ecosystem research. Much of this research was focused on the severely depressed, Oweekeno Lake sockeye salmon population on the British Columbia Central Coast. I intend to pursue a particularly significant finding regarding the ecosystem interactions in the seaward migration of these sockeye salmon to ascertain the extent to which these might be common to other populations. I also intend to make significant improvements to widely useful statistical methodology that emerged from this project. Finally, I propose to pursue several, unanticipated but strong hints of an impact of the 18.6-year lunar nodal cycle on both aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems in western Canada. I provide a summary of the last two of these challenges below.Research Question: Can tightened simultaneous confidence bounds be developed for functional regression analyses? There are many instances where insight is sought on the relationship between a physical parameter (such as river discharge) that is monitored daily and a biological variable (such as marine survival for an out-migrating cohort of sockeye salmon). Is, e.g., river discharge linked to marine survival? And if so, over what portion of the year? Functional regression analysis links an x-variable that is in fact a function over time (daily river discharge), to a y-variable (annual marine survival), and provides a means for addressing these questions. In this analysis, the regression coefficient in a standard linear regression equation is replaced by a function over time. The second question above then becomes, "For which days is the regression function non-zero? ". This is a simultaneous inference problem, akin to standard multiple comparisons of means associated with an analysis of variance. The approach that I and two others proposed recently provides appropriate protection against false claims of significance, but is relatively conservative (akin to Scheffé's method for multiple comparisons of means). I propose to use so-called tube-based, analytical methods to reduce this conservatism. Our proposal is already gaining traction, and such an improvement would enhance its utility.Research Question: To what extent does the 18.6-year lunar nodal cycle (in the relative orientations of the apparent paths of the moon vs. the sun) influence terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems in Western North America? Potential oceanographic and climate-related impacts of this cycle have recently been described, including sea surface and atmospheric impacts along the Pacific Coast of North America, and potential causal mechanisms have been modeled. I, in collaboration with others, have found strong hints of periodic fluctuations in several aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems in western Canada, including (i) a proxy for juvenile sockeye salmon abundance in a rearing lake, (ii) nitrogen concentrations in a coastal flood plain, (iii) charcoal concentrations in an inland lake, and (iv) tree growth rates in the lake watershed. I have also found similar periodicities in an ad hoc analysis of archived records for the growth of subalpine fir and black spruce in north-western Canada. I intend to pursue this remarkable, serendipitous discovery by (i) generating further, finer-resolution and longer time series for the proxy for salmon abundance, (ii) performing a more rigorous and extensive assessment of the archived tree growth records, and (iii) collecting further evidence from the area where the above tree-growth dependence appears to be strongest – in the northwest corner of British Columbia and adjacent Yukon Territory.

我最近的研究产生了（i）与紧迫的保护问题相关的生态系统相互作用的基本见解，以及（ii）用于生态系统研究的有价值的统计工具，这项研究的大部分内容集中在严重萧条的奥威肯诺湖红鲑鱼种群上。我打算对这些红鲑向海迁徙过程中的生态系统相互作用进行一项特别重要的发现，以确定这些对其他种群的共同程度，我还打算对广泛使用的进行重大改进。该项目产生的统计方法。最后，我建议追寻 18.6 年月交点周期对加拿大西部水生和陆地生态系统影响的几个意想不到但强烈的暗示。我在下面总结了最后两个挑战。为功能回归分析制定更严格的同时置信界限？ 在许多情况下，人们都在寻求对每日监测的物理参数（例如河流流量）与生物变量（例如海洋生物的生存）之间关系的深入了解。例如，河流流量与海洋生存相关吗？如果是，函数回归分析与实际上随时间变化的 x 变量相关联吗？排放），到 y 变量（海洋年生存率），并提供了解决这些问题的方法。在该分析中，标准线性回归方程中的回归系数被随时间变化的函数取代。上面的第二个问题就变成了。 ，“对于哪个天是回归函数非零吗？”。这是一个同时推理问题，类似于与方差分析相关的标准多重比较。我和另外两个人最近提出的方法提供了适当的保护，防止虚假的重要性声明，但相对保守（类似于 Scheffé 的多重比较方法），我建议使用所谓的基于管的分析方法来减少这种保守性，并且这种改进将增强其实用性。研究问题：至18.6 年的月球交点周期（以月球与太阳视路径的相对方向而言）对北美西部的陆地和水生生态系统的影响有多大？最近该周期的潜在海洋和气候相关影响如何？所描述的，包括北美太平洋沿岸的海面和大气影响，以及潜在的因果机制已经被建模，我与其他人合作，发现了几种水生和大气周期性波动的强烈暗示。加拿大西部的陆地生态系统，包括（i）饲养湖泊中幼年红鲑鱼丰度的指标，（ii）沿海洪泛区的氮浓度，（iii）内陆湖中的木炭浓度，以及（iv）树木生长率我在对加拿大西北部亚高山冷杉和黑云杉生长档案记录的临时分析中也发现了类似的周期性，我打算追寻这一非凡的、偶然的发现。通过以下方式发现：(i) 生成进一步、更高分辨率和更长的时间序列来代表鲑鱼丰度，(ii) 对存档的树木生长记录进行更严格和更广泛的评估，以及 (iii) 从该地区收集进一步的证据上述对树木生长的依赖性似乎最强——在不列颠哥伦比亚省的西北角和邻近的育空地区。