Periodic Reporting for period 1 - NECCTON (New Copernicus capability for trophic ocean networks)
Berichtszeitraum: 2023-01-01 bis 2024-04-30
The ocean’s biodiversity supports the livelihoods of over three billion people, providing vital services, including food supply and nutrient cycling. However marine policy and resource management cannot yet exploit the latest scientific advances, even when the state-of-the-art operational models of the European Copernicus Marine Service are used.
Our overall objective is to enable the Copernicus Marine to deliver novel operational products that inform the conservation of marine biodiversity and the sustainable management of seafood resources. The approach is to fuse new data into innovative ecosystem models that integrate biological and abiotic components, habitats, and stressors of marine ecosystems.
NECCTON will inter-link new models in the Copernicus Marine Service, thus building novel operational capacities to simulate higher-trophic-levels (fishes and marine mammals), benthic habitats, pollutants, and deliver projections of climate impacts on the ecosystem. We will develop and exploit new data-processing chains, supporting the use of novel ecosystem observations, including new hyperspectral data from satellites, as well as available acoustic, pollution and omics data. We will fuse these new data and models by using innovative machine-learning algorithms to improve models and data assimilation methods. These developments will be applied in thirteen case studies, co-designed with fisheries and conservation managers as part of our pathway-to-impact, resulting in the demonstration of Technological Readiness Level 6 of the NECCTON products.
The objectives will be achieved by a team of twenty-three world-class organizations with track records for all the key project components. The work will be carried out under the auspices of the UNESCO-IOC, which endorsed the project as an action of the UN Decade of Ocean science for sustainable development.
On project completion, NECCTON will provide CMEMS with the scientific and technical capabilities to sustain twenty-seven new products in their operational portfolio, ultimately enabling users to make informed decisions on the exploitation of marine services, enhancing sustainability and conservation.
Our overall objective is to enable the Copernicus Marine to deliver novel operational products that inform the conservation of marine biodiversity and the sustainable management of seafood resources. The approach is to fuse new data into innovative ecosystem models that integrate biological and abiotic components, habitats, and stressors of marine ecosystems.
NECCTON will inter-link new models in the Copernicus Marine Service, thus building novel operational capacities to simulate higher-trophic-levels (fishes and marine mammals), benthic habitats, pollutants, and deliver projections of climate impacts on the ecosystem. We will develop and exploit new data-processing chains, supporting the use of novel ecosystem observations, including new hyperspectral data from satellites, as well as available acoustic, pollution and omics data. We will fuse these new data and models by using innovative machine-learning algorithms to improve models and data assimilation methods. These developments will be applied in thirteen case studies, co-designed with fisheries and conservation managers as part of our pathway-to-impact, resulting in the demonstration of Technological Readiness Level 6 of the NECCTON products.
The objectives will be achieved by a team of twenty-three world-class organizations with track records for all the key project components. The work will be carried out under the auspices of the UNESCO-IOC, which endorsed the project as an action of the UN Decade of Ocean science for sustainable development.
On project completion, NECCTON will provide CMEMS with the scientific and technical capabilities to sustain twenty-seven new products in their operational portfolio, ultimately enabling users to make informed decisions on the exploitation of marine services, enhancing sustainability and conservation.
The current main can be summarized as:
Define and disseminate the best practices to be followed to develop, share and communicate the NECCTON’s modelling tools, data products and achievements internally and externally (for deliverables).
Advanced new process in the models of the Copernicus Marine Service: zooplankton vertical migration and linking to HTLs, DOC and POC production and sinking, inclusion of optical active compounds, linking pelagic and bottom SPM dynamics, modelling benthic habitat suitability and functions to bottom environmental conditions, the development, adaptation and coupling of the seventeen fish/mammals models progressed as well as the development and testing of pollution and stressors models.
Definition of the twenty-seven new products to support fisheries management and biodiversity conservation initiate through a co-design workshop with stakeholders, with details shared through the public release and dissemination of four product-specification deliverables available on the project website.
Innovative and efficient machine learning algorithms have been completed for nitrate bias correction and developed up to different stages for emulation of unobserved variables, traits and biodiversity mapping, zooplankton vertical migration, fish migration.
A first iteration of the novel software prototype framework interlinking the CMEMS physical-LTL models and the novel models developed in NECCTON was delivered publicly, along with a best-practices guide.
The evaluation of a proof-of-concept chain for the production and assimilation of L2 open ocean products for hyper-spectral PRISMA satellite data has started by processing 69 cloud-free images over two sites in the Black Sea and two sites in the Mediterranean Sea covering a period of three years.
New modules for hyper-spectral data assimilation based on inversion methods and on Ensemble Transform Kalman Filter have been set-up and tested.
The development of the visualization tools for the NECCTON products has started through workshops across tools and products developers, to define needs, conventions, standards, metadata.
Define and disseminate the best practices to be followed to develop, share and communicate the NECCTON’s modelling tools, data products and achievements internally and externally (for deliverables).
Advanced new process in the models of the Copernicus Marine Service: zooplankton vertical migration and linking to HTLs, DOC and POC production and sinking, inclusion of optical active compounds, linking pelagic and bottom SPM dynamics, modelling benthic habitat suitability and functions to bottom environmental conditions, the development, adaptation and coupling of the seventeen fish/mammals models progressed as well as the development and testing of pollution and stressors models.
Definition of the twenty-seven new products to support fisheries management and biodiversity conservation initiate through a co-design workshop with stakeholders, with details shared through the public release and dissemination of four product-specification deliverables available on the project website.
Innovative and efficient machine learning algorithms have been completed for nitrate bias correction and developed up to different stages for emulation of unobserved variables, traits and biodiversity mapping, zooplankton vertical migration, fish migration.
A first iteration of the novel software prototype framework interlinking the CMEMS physical-LTL models and the novel models developed in NECCTON was delivered publicly, along with a best-practices guide.
The evaluation of a proof-of-concept chain for the production and assimilation of L2 open ocean products for hyper-spectral PRISMA satellite data has started by processing 69 cloud-free images over two sites in the Black Sea and two sites in the Mediterranean Sea covering a period of three years.
New modules for hyper-spectral data assimilation based on inversion methods and on Ensemble Transform Kalman Filter have been set-up and tested.
The development of the visualization tools for the NECCTON products has started through workshops across tools and products developers, to define needs, conventions, standards, metadata.
Cutting-edge research supported by, and contributing to, the project has been presented in six scientific peer-reviewed publications. Summaries below, refer to the publication for a thorough description of the work and its potential impact.
Future Pacific oyster recruitment was modeled based on heat exposure under four climate scenarios. Results show recruitment areas could be over twice as high under SSP5 8.5 compared to low emissions scenario SSP1 2.6. [Wilson R, Kay S, Ciavatta S. Partitioning climate uncertainty in ecological projections: Pacific oysters in a hotter Europe. Ecological Informatics. 2024.]
A novel parameterization of the CDOM cycle in the Mediterranean Sea was developed to account for the light- and nutrient-dependent dynamics of local CDOM production, degradation, and vertical transport. Results show that including nutrient and light dependence improves the simulation of the seasonal and vertical dynamics of aCDOM(λ), revealing a subsurface maximum forming in spring and intensifying in summer. [Álvarez E et al. Chromophoric dissolved organic matter dynamics revealed through the optimization of an optical–biogeochemical model in the northwestern Mediterranean Sea. Biogeosciences. 2023.]
The impact of bottom trawl fisheries on benthic effect trait composition was examined in thirteen case studies. Bottom trawling was identified as a selective force in most cases. This research marks an initial step towards assessing trawling effects on benthos-mediated biogeochemical processes. [Beauchard O. et al. Trawling-induced change in benthic effect trait composition – A multiple case study. Frontiers in Marine Science. 2023].
A complex network theory was used to better represent and understand the ecosystem connectivity in a shelf sea environment. The results of this study describe how information is expected to propagate through the shelf sea ecosystem, and how it can be used in multiple future applications such as stochastic noise modelling, data assimilation, or machine learning [Higgs I, et al. Investigating ecosystem connections in the shelf sea environment using complex networks. Biogeosciences. 2024]
A multi-model approach using non-parametric generalized regression and various indicators to select a robust statistical downscaling model was developed for future projections. Results showed the effectiveness of a multi-model selection, as individual model performance varies by case. [Oliveros-Ramos R et al. 2023. A multi-model selection approach for statistical downscaling…. ESS Open Archive. 2023]
Important issues regarding functional diversity assessment in the marine benthos in the context of ecosystem functioning was pointed out [Beauchard O. The importance of trait selection on the meaning of functional diversity in benthic studies. Frontiers in Marine Science. 2023]
Future Pacific oyster recruitment was modeled based on heat exposure under four climate scenarios. Results show recruitment areas could be over twice as high under SSP5 8.5 compared to low emissions scenario SSP1 2.6. [Wilson R, Kay S, Ciavatta S. Partitioning climate uncertainty in ecological projections: Pacific oysters in a hotter Europe. Ecological Informatics. 2024.]
A novel parameterization of the CDOM cycle in the Mediterranean Sea was developed to account for the light- and nutrient-dependent dynamics of local CDOM production, degradation, and vertical transport. Results show that including nutrient and light dependence improves the simulation of the seasonal and vertical dynamics of aCDOM(λ), revealing a subsurface maximum forming in spring and intensifying in summer. [Álvarez E et al. Chromophoric dissolved organic matter dynamics revealed through the optimization of an optical–biogeochemical model in the northwestern Mediterranean Sea. Biogeosciences. 2023.]
The impact of bottom trawl fisheries on benthic effect trait composition was examined in thirteen case studies. Bottom trawling was identified as a selective force in most cases. This research marks an initial step towards assessing trawling effects on benthos-mediated biogeochemical processes. [Beauchard O. et al. Trawling-induced change in benthic effect trait composition – A multiple case study. Frontiers in Marine Science. 2023].
A complex network theory was used to better represent and understand the ecosystem connectivity in a shelf sea environment. The results of this study describe how information is expected to propagate through the shelf sea ecosystem, and how it can be used in multiple future applications such as stochastic noise modelling, data assimilation, or machine learning [Higgs I, et al. Investigating ecosystem connections in the shelf sea environment using complex networks. Biogeosciences. 2024]
A multi-model approach using non-parametric generalized regression and various indicators to select a robust statistical downscaling model was developed for future projections. Results showed the effectiveness of a multi-model selection, as individual model performance varies by case. [Oliveros-Ramos R et al. 2023. A multi-model selection approach for statistical downscaling…. ESS Open Archive. 2023]
Important issues regarding functional diversity assessment in the marine benthos in the context of ecosystem functioning was pointed out [Beauchard O. The importance of trait selection on the meaning of functional diversity in benthic studies. Frontiers in Marine Science. 2023]