LTER Aquatic Scientists Review Past Successes to Plan for Future Collaborations

John Hobbie, ARC LTER, PIE LTER Marine Biological Laboratory, The Ecosystems Center, Woods Hole, MA

On 5-6 February 2000, 29 scientists from 13 LTER sites met in Salt Lake City to share project information and decide upon ASM workshops for comparative aquatic studies. Established sites represented were AND, ARC, CAP, CWT, LUQ, MCM, NTL, PAL, PIE, and VCR. New sites were California/Santa Barbara (SBC), Florida Coastal Ecosystems (FCE), and Georgia (GCE). Roberta Marinelli (Polar Programs) and Phil Taylor (Ocean Sciences) represented the National Science Foundation while Robert Waide and James Brunt attended from the Network Office.

The meeting included a description of the present and planned aquatic research at the sites. To illustrate the possible ways that cross-site research has operated within the LTER program, Stan Gregory reported on LIDET, George Kling described a workshop on CO₂ cycling in lakes, Jack Webster described the series of Stream Workshops held over the years, and Bruce Peterson reported on the LINX project on nitrogen cycling in streams (this began with LTER funding). Chuck Hopkinson described the cross-site LMER research on the characterization of organic matter in rivers.

The preliminary list of topics suggested for the ASM includes: regulation of organic matter preservation in wetland sediments; human modifications of hydrologic cycles: effects on nutrient dynamics and local and regional scales; strategies for examining the role of species interactions on ecosystem processes; and cross-site measurements of the geographical distribution of microbial species and their relation to ecosystem properties. The meeting was sponsored by the LMER (Land Margin Ecosystem Research) Coordinating Office -- its last official act now that the funding for the LMER sites has been transformed into new LTER sites.