Division of Biological Sciences

From Microbes to Mussels: Monitoring Life in Vital Coastal Zones

In the grand, global scheme of things, the vast and teeming waters of the world’s oceans, the far-flung land masses thriving with flora and fauna, the massive currents of moving air that swirl and sweep across continents, what does the life of a microbe, or a sand crab, or a seagull matter?

You might well ask the same question about the canary in the coal mine, and the answer would be the same: It matters very much indeed, as members of the Division of Biological Sciences at UC San Diego and the Scripps Institution of Oceanography will readily explain. What happens to ecosystems in the world’s coastal zones –“where the surf meets the turf”–is every bit as fraught with significance as the caged bird’s behavior deep underground.

A new interdisciplinary initiative, “Biology at the Land—Sea Interface,” intends to describe in detail the biodiversity of coastal zones, using California’s extensive shores as a model. The project will study how coastal ecosystems function and will help develop plans to manage these unique biological resources now threatened as never before.

Scientists have typically separated the study of terrestrial ecosystems and marine ecosystems. That approach, say Kaustuv Roy and Ronald Burton, two of the initiative’s authors, is clearly insufficient. “We need to replace it with an approach that treats these as coupled systems, with changes in one affecting the other,” they argue. “There is a tremendous opportunity here for collaborations between terrestrial and marine biologists, earth scientists, social scientists, and resource and environmental economists. UCSD has excellent faculty in all of these areas, so an initiative like this one is particularly relevant on this campus.”

Roy, a UCSD professor of biological sciences, and Burton, a professor of marine biology at SIO, say that global climate change and “anthropogenic stressors” such as urbanization, pollution and over-harvesting of fish have impacts whose consequences are linked and far-reaching. For example, Burton says, “Salmon live much of their lives in the ocean, but move into coastal streams to spawn and die, and in doing so they move a large amount of nitrogen derived from the ocean into the forests bordering the coastal watersheds. Thus, protecting salmon-spawning habitats is beneficial not only for fisheries but also for forests along the streams.”

Similarly, he says, deforestation changes sediment loads and nutrient fluxes into the coastal ocean and its complex near-shore ecosystems. “Add to this the linkage between nutrient inputs and the use of fertilizer compounds in agriculture, and it’s clear that human activities are impacting the ecological dynamics of coastal systems from the bottom up.”

Eric Allen, an assistant professor in the Division of Biological Sciences as well as marine biology at SIO, describes those near-shore ecosystems as “a remarkably diverse set of habitats, including rocky shores, sandy beaches, salt marshes, bays and estuaries that harbor an equally diverse set of microbes, plants and animals comprising some of the most unique ecosystems of the world.”

A quick glance at any map, he says, will reveal that most of the large cities around the globe are either on, or close to, a coastline. “But despite their importance,” Allen says, “coastal ecosystems remain poorly studied and their future uncertain.”

The interdisciplinary initiative they propose aims to remedy that oversight and neglect, says Gabriele Wienhausen, a senior lecturer in the biological sciences and associate dean for education in the Division of Biological Sciences. “The goal is to develop new approaches for studying the problem using emerging technologies,” she adds. “A scientific effort in this area would also provide a valuable opportunity for graduate and undergraduate students to get hands-on training and research experience working on a crucial real-world problem.”

The initiative’s authors say that biology at the land—sea interface will focus on creating an inventory of microbial and invertebrate biodiversity; documenting the responses of coastal ecosystems (from microbes to mussels) to climate change and urbanization; mapping genetic connectivities (for example, habitat fragmentation and climate change can alter patterns of gene flow); studying the biological consequences of over-exploitation; and understanding the effects of introduced species, essential for managing the threats many of them can pose.

They envision, as Wienhausen has said, a prominent teaching component for the initiative. An education center would support several related activities. It would involve science majors in current research on the biology of coastal ecosystems; provide non-science majors with a hands-on connection to the concepts of scientific reasoning; help train future scientists and policy makers; and ensure collaboration with scientists and policy makers from other countries, especially developing countries, where ecological challenges are greatest, to encourage long-term protection of coastal biodiversity.

The obstacles are daunting, they admit, but the biologists and UC San Diego bring impressive assets to the task.

The importance of understanding the planet’s seas, for example, was recently marked by a $97.7 million grant from the Joint Oceanographic Institutions to a partnership of Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute, the Oregon State University College of Oceanic and Atmospheric Science, and the Scripps Institution of Oceanography here at UCSD. The resulting research will help inform the study of coastal ecosystems, among many other benefits. In addition, the governors of California, Oregon and Washington agreed in 2006 to actively collaborate on protecting our coastal resources.

According to Allen, the program is an opportunity to provide much-needed scientific support for ongoing efforts worldwide to integrate freshwater, terrestrial and marine environments through integrated, ecosystem-based management, an approach called for by more than 200 academic scientists and policy experts.

Probably most important, though, is the interdisciplinary nature of the initiative, a research trend for which the Division of Biological Sciences, SIO, and UC San Diego as an institution are internationally known. Combining the diverse perspectives and talents of terrestrial biologists, marine biologists, earth scientists, economists, social scientists and others, Biology at the Land-Sea Interface should have the wisdom, resources and skills to safeguard the ecology of our coasts, from microbes to mollusks.

Contributing Writer: Paul Kennedy Mueller

From BioSphere Magazine, 2007-2008 issue, page 8.