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Project properties |
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| Title | Breath in – breath out: respiration in lakes |
| Group | Aquatic Ecology and Water Quality Management Group |
| Project type | thesis |
| Credits | 12 |
| Supervisor(s) | Sarian Kosten (RUN-NIOO)
Edwin Peeters (AEW-WUR) |
| Examiner(s) | M Scheffer |
| Contact info | s.kosten@science.ru.nl
edwin.peeters@wur.nl |
| Begin date | 2014/03/01 |
| End date | 2014/12/31 |
| Description | In 2014 a large mesocosm experiment studying the effect of warming on shallow lakes will be initiated at the NIOO-KNAW in Wageningen. One of the things that will be looked into is aquatic respiration. Primary production in aquatic systems has historically received much more attention than respiration. Now that it is clear that aquatic ecosystems play an important role in the global carbon cycle some advances have been made in the understanding and quantification of respiration in aquatic ecosystems. Nevertheless, respiration still receives far less attention than primary production. This is unmerited considering that respiration is responsible for the CO2 ‘breathing out’ of aquatic ecosystems.
Most of the current knowledge about aquatic ecosystem respiration is based on the analyses of 24 hour oxygen curves obtained from high frequency oxygen measurements. It is, however, notoriously difficult to contribute fractions of the total ecosystem respiration to the different organism groups responsible for the ecosystem respiration. In this project you will undertake one of the first attempts to achieve this. Additionally you will look into the effect of warming on the total respiration and on potential changes in the contribution of various organisms groups to the ecosystem respiration. In this research you will (1) sample different organism groups (phytoplankton, bacterioplankton, macroinvertebrates and zooplankton) from a set of mesocosms maintained at different temperatures, (2) determine their respiration rates and (3) fill in gaps regarding abundances and biomass regarding these organism groups. You will form part of a divers research team working together in the mesocosms on topics varying from greenhouse gas balances, phytoplankton and zooplankton composition and nutrient fluxes. Joining the team will thus provide you the opportunity to learn many different techniques and enhance your knowledge regarding a wide variety of “hot” research topics. The experiments will predominantly take place in Wageningen at the NIOO-KNAW and you should therefore be willing to commute. |
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