Details of Award
NERC Reference : NER/A/S/2002/00759
Switching mechanisms, biodiversity and ecosystem stability in complex shallow lake communities.
Grant Award
- Principal Investigator:
- Professor B Moss, University of Liverpool, Sch of Biological Sciences
- Grant held at:
- University of Liverpool, Sch of Biological Sciences
- Science Area:
- Freshwater
- Overall Classification:
- Freshwater
- ENRIs:
- Pollution and Waste
- Biodiversity
- Science Topics:
- Water Quality
- Ecosystem Scale Processes
- Conservation Ecology
- Abstract:
- Wetland lake systems can exist in alternative states of plant or plankton dominance. Each is stabilised by biological mechanisms, and nutrient-influenced but independent, switch mechanisms are required to convert one to the other. There is circumstantial but little experimental evidence for switch mechanisms. Also the restoration of diverse plant dominated systems is often unstable, perhaps because nutrients have been insufficiently controlled. Recent changes in Hickling Broad, Norfolk, offer an opportunity to test three hypotheses: that rising salinity can act as a switch, that nitrogen, rather than phosphorus is the more important controlling nutrient, and that the stability of the system is determined by plant diversity, which in turn is controlled by nitrogen loading. A major experiment will be carried out in controlled mesocosms to test these three hypotheses.
- NERC Reference:
- NER/A/S/2002/00759
- Grant Stage:
- Completed
- Scheme:
- Standard Grants Pre FEC
- Grant Status:
- Closed
- Programme:
- Standard Grant
This grant award has a total value of £178,556
FDAB - Financial Details (Award breakdown by headings)
| Total - T&S | Total - Staff | Total - Other Costs | Total - Indirect Costs |
|---|---|---|---|
| £3,204 | £84,603 | £51,833 | £38,918 |
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