AMBON (Arctic MBON) – linking biodiversity observations in the Arctic

PI: Iken, Katrin (University of Alaska Fairbanks)
Start Year: 2022 | Duration: 5 years
Partners: NASA, Office of Naval Research, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, University of Alaska Fairbanks, University of Maryland Center for Environmental Sciences, Oregon State University, University of Washington, Alaska Ocean Observing System, Native Village of Kotzebue

Project Abstract:

The Arctic Marine Biodiversity Observation Network (AMBON) is designed to provide high-quality biodiversity data from the Arctic Chukchi Sea across trophic levels, from microbes to whales. The Arctic Ocean marginal seas are among the fastest-warming regions in the world, with ecosystem changes across all trophic levels that carry repercussions to ecosystem function. The Alaskan Arctic is also home to numerous Indigenous communities that depend on marine resources for food security and traditional cultural lifestyle. Arctic biodiversity data are important for understanding these changes and supporting decision-making by regional and federal resource managers, Indigenous communities, and other stakeholders. The objectives of the AMBON project are to collect biodiversity data across trophic levels and in relation to environmental conditions; to use biodiversity data to detect changes in species composition, including invasive species; and determine effective in situ observing designs through modeling. For this, we employ a combination of traditional collection tools and approaches with state-of-the-art technologies. The latter include year-round moored instrumentation: a microphone recorder to detect marine mammal sounds, environmental DNA (eDNA) analyses from a time series water sampler, and a benthic time-lapse camera. We also aim to apply a new, regionally-downscaled seascape model for the Chukchi Sea to regional biodiversity data. In this proposal, the AMBON project also engages in new partnerships to extend biodiversity observations. First, we link our Chukchi Sea regional biodiversity and environmental observations to animal tracking data, by assessing the prey field of migrating short-tailed shearwaters in their Arctic feeding grounds and their Australian breeding ground reproductive success. This collaboration will foster a new connection between two NOAA-led programs: the Animal Telemetry Network (ATN) and the MBON. Second, we engage in a new partnership with Indigenous stakeholders by expanding our shelf-based observations to include coastal, year-round observations from a community-based coastal observing network in Kotzebue Sound. This will extend our spatial extent to a currently undersampled but ecologically significant region, as Kotzebue Sound is a biologically productive shallow-water embayment that receives the largest riverine influx of the Chukchi Sea. Another important objective of the AMBON project is to continue and expand its networking and collaborations from regional to national to international scales. Regionally, we will collaborate with other research projects for shared logistics, complementary sampling, and common data sharing strategies. Nationally, we have been an active partner of the MBON program since the inception, providing a polar perspective, and we will continue to contribute to the goal of standardized biodiversity observations, common sampling protocols, and joint shared open-access data sharing policies. Internationally, pan-Arctic linkages such as with an Arctic Council biodiversity working group place the AMBON data within a broader polar context. The AMBON project also was an organizing partner of the Marine Life 2030 initiative, which has been endorsed by the UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development and which provides a platform to coordinate biodiversity information on a global scale. Lastly, the ultimate key to a successful biodiversity observing network is timely, open-access data sharing, for which we strive as a project and as a coordinated MBON group.