Carol Robinson, University of East Anglia

This paper synthesis of current knowledge of microbial plankton respiration in relation to deoxygenation, including the drivers of its variability and possible constraints to our ability to project future scenarios.

Microbial plankton respiration is key to the balance between the storage of organic carbon in the oceans or its conversion to CO2 with accompanying consumption of dissolved oxygen. Many areas of the world´s oceans have experienced reduced dissolved oxygen concentrations for the past 50 years, and this ocean deoxygenation trend it seems set to continue. Despite its central role in ocean deoxygenation, microbial respiration is one of the least constrained microbial metabolic processes. There is thus the need for improved understanding of the magnitude and variability of respiration, and the attribution to component plankton groups. This, together with the quantification of the respiratory quotient, would enable better predictions, and projections of the intensity and extent of ocean deoxygenation and of the integrative impact of ocean deoxygenation, ocean acidification, warming, and changes in nutrient concentration and stoichiometry on marine carbon storage

Deadline for the fully funded international Master programme in Water and Coastal Management is January the 15th, 2019 at 12:00 Central European Time (CET)

https://wacoma.unibo.it/

The Global Science Opera (GSO) is the brain-child of Oded Ben-Horin. The goal of this initiative is to boost scientific interest in learners through a combination of curiosity-driven education and artistic expression in the form of digital interactions and live-streaming.

The 8^th IMBeR China-Japan-Korea (CJK) Symposium was held at the East China Normal University in Shanghai, China last month. The theme was Marine Biogeochemical Sciences for the Sustainability of the West Pacific Biosphere. In addition to participants from China, Japan and Korea, the symposium attracted researchers and students from Thailand, India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Malaysia and Canada.

Following the symposium, the IMBeR Human Dimensions Working Group held a training course. These meetings are held every second year and the next one will be in Thailand in 2020.

Although ecosystem services are increasingly embedded in policy agendas, it is largely unknown if and how policy actors are considering them. This paper features a retrospective analysis of interviews with key policy actors involved in the strategic decision-making process leading to an innovative large-scale Dutch coastal management project, the Sand Motor mega beach nourishment. The interviews were analysed to ascertain which ecosystem services were considered and how they were described by policy actors. The findings suggest that broad, unspecified ecosystem services were adopted highly by the policy actors, while specific ecosystem service categories were rarely considered. Also, relatable and easy to understand cultural ecosystem services also constituted critical arguments for policy actors in their strategic decision making. The study suggests a ‘translation step’ between ecosystem services research and decision making for ecosystem services to truly align with relevant aspects of decision making.

Alexander van Oudenhven et al, 2018, ’Mind the Gap’ between ecosystem services classification and strategic decision making. Ecosystem Services. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecoser.2018.09.003