2020 | Freshwater Salinization Impacts
FACULTY SEED GRANT | Global Change Center
Salty carbon: Testing the consequences of freshwater salinization on stream food web dynamics and ecosystem metabolism
INVESTIGATORS:
- Dr. Erin Hotchkiss, Biological Sciences
- Dr. Sally Entrekin, Entomology
- Dr. Stephen Schoenholtz, Forest Resources and Environmental Conservation
- Dr. Daniel McLaughlin, Forest Resources and Environmental Conservation
Freshwater salinization is a global change issue with unknown consequences for food webs and ecosystem functions. Our current understanding of salinization is based on biological indicators (e.g., changes in microbial and invertebrate communities, not whole ecosystem processes (e.g., resource use, metabolism). We will leverage (1) long-term water chemistry and macroinvertebrate community data (Schoenholtz, McLaughlin) and (2) recent macroinvertebrate biomass assessments (Entrekin) to (3) integrate 1-2 with basal resource production, macroinvertebrate resource use, and ecosystem-scale metabolism in one coal mining-impacted (salinized) and one reference stream in Virginia.
Stream food webs are supported by resources from both terrestrial (leaves, soil-derived organic matter) and aquatic (in-stream photosynthesis) sources; how salinization alters consumer resource use and ecosystem-scale metabolism (photosynthesis, respiration) is unknown. As one NSF reviewer has previously commented: “this proposed research is especially exciting as it bridges ecosystem metabolism and food web research approaches, two fields that have typically been isolated but should be merged to better understand carbon cycling in streams.” The GCC seed grant will allow the team to generate preliminary data on resource pools and integrate measurements of basal resources, macroinvertebrate resource use, and whole-stream metabolism using our collective expertise in hydrology, biogeochemistry, and community and ecosystem ecology.
Reference citations for project proposal description available upon request.
Each year, the GCC, with funding from the FLSI and the ISCE at Virginia Tech, accepts proposals from GCC faculty to support interdisciplinary research that will lead to collaborative proposals submitted to extramural funding sources. We are seeking projects that link multiple faculty programs and take advantage of unique combinations of expertise at VT, have societal implications and/or a policy component, deal with emerging global change issues that have regional and global significance, and have high potential to eventually leverage external resources.
