Climate Change Effects on Freshwater Organisms and Ecosystems
A special issue of Water (ISSN 2073-4441). This special issue belongs to the section "Biodiversity and Functionality of Aquatic Ecosystems".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 June 2016) | Viewed by 12474
Special Issue Editors
Interests: water quality modeling in aquatic systems; lakes; water quality monitoring; climate change impacts; ecological modeling; fish habitat modeling; eutrophication; surface hydrology; hydrological modeling and analysis; stormwater management
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Interests: population ecology; invasive species; ecotoxicology; population bottlenecks; physiological ecology; freshwater invertebrates
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Understanding the effects of the changing global environment on freshwater organisms and ecosystems is fundamental to improving ecological and environmental strategies and mitigation methods to protect freshwater ecosystems. Although freshwater systems (streams, lakes, and reservoirs) comprise less than 1% of the world’s water, they play a critically important role in the Earth’s ecosystem and biosphere. Freshwater systems contain a disproportionately high level of species richness (species/km2) compared to marine and terrestrial systems, but, unfortunately, they also contain a disproportionately high level of imperiled species. Freshwater systems are also a critical source of drinking and irrigation water for humans. Changes in the global environment are driven by a combination of natural and anthropogenic (e.g. urban/agricultural/industrial) drivers, resulting in changing climate and land-use/land-cover patterns. These changes may lead to hydrological, chemical, and biological changes in freshwater systems and associated watersheds. Water quality is a critical issue due to its direct influence on public health, biological integrity of natural resources, and the economy. For example, feedbacks between water quality and aquatic organisms directly impact dissolved oxygen and carbon dioxide source/sink dynamics. Temperature, nutrients, light penetration, and pollutants affect dissolved oxygen and carbon dioxide production and consumption rates via processes such as photosynthesis of actively growing plants and decomposition of dead plants and animals. Climate variations (seasonal or inter-annual) directly affect the heat budget of aquatic systems through surface heat exchange between the water and atmosphere. An increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide and/or other greenhouse gases is projected to exacerbate climate warming, which would further alter water temperature, ice/snow cover, and water quality characteristics in aquatic systems. Land-use/land-cover changes and anthropogenic changes affect sediment, nutrient, and chemical inputs to aquatic systems. These changes are, in turn, expected to have major impacts on population dynamics and diversity of freshwater species. A major challenge for scientists and managers is to understand the complex system of feedbacks between global change, freshwater ecosystems, and the wide array of biodiversity and ecosystem services that freshwater systems provide.
Dr. Xing Fang
Dr. James Stoeckel
Guest Editors
Manuscript Submission Information
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Keywords
- global change
- freshwater ecosystem
- climate change
- ecological health
- water quality
- freshwater organism
- fish habitat
- feedbacks
- land use
- biodiversity
- ecosystem services
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