Grant: Strategic Projects Supplemental Competition

We are submitting this proposal as part of the Healthy Environment and Ecosystem target area under the special NSERC Strategic project grant initiative. Our specific research topic is Ecosystem Adaptation, Interventions and Modeling in the context of marine oxygen minimum zones (OMZs). OMZs are areas of low dissolved oxygen concentrations that play a major role in biogeochemical cycling within the world's oceans. They are major sinks for nitrogen and sources for the greenhouse gases carbon dioxide and nitrous oxide. Therefore, microbial mediated biological activity associated with these systems impacts the productivity of the deep blue sea and global climate balance. There is increasing evidence that ocean warming trends will decrease dissolved oxygen concentrations within the coastal and interior regions of the Eastern North Pacific causing an expansion of the hypoxic boundary layer. This expansion will have a direct effect on coastal benthic ecosystems and the productivity of marine fisheries due to habitat loss and changes in nutrient cycling. In order to understand, respond to, or mitigate these transitions it is imperative that studies to monitor and model microbial dynamics in relation to physical and chemical oceanographic parameters be put into place. To this end, we are seeking support from NSERC to chart the genomic diversity of indigenous microbial communities found in coastal and open ocean OMZs in the Eastern North Pacific Ocean. The goals of this research program promise to provide a solid comparative genomic foundation for understanding the biogeochemical processes at work in marine OMZs around the globe, in addition to identifying and describing the key microbial players and biochemical pathways contributing to carbon and nitrogen metabolism within the Eastern North Pacific Ocean.