Arctic Marine Biodiversity Observing Network (AMBON)

Project Description

The goal of the Arctic Marine Biodiversity Observing Network (AMBON) project is to build an operational marine biodiversity observation network (AMBON) for the US Chukchi Sea continental shelf. The purpose of a MBON is to gather new and continued biodiversity information, provide open access to data, and to facilitate decision making by a large variety of stakeholders. The AMBON projects covers marine biodiversity from microbes to whales. The project builds on existing data and time series with the goal to continue sampling and also to close current gaps in taxonomic coverage (e.g. microbes) in biodiversity observation on the Chukchi shelf. The project also will integrate with past and ongoing research programs on the US Arctic shelf to develop an Arctic biodiversity observation network of shared information and open data access. Beyond the Chukchi Sea, AMBON will network across the pan-Arctic and on a global scale with other biodiversity observing networks. As a demonstration project, AMBON aims to develop good practices of a biodiversity network that can be translated on a national level to other regions and ecosystems.

AMBON website

AMBON Poster

AMBON poster

 

Project Funding

NOAA, BOEM, Shell Industry
Amount: 6,000,000
Start Date: 2014-11-00 End Date: 2019-10-00

 

Research Team

Katrin Iken

Katrin Iken

Principal Investigator

Professor


Specialties
:

  • Trophic interactions and food web analysis
  • Benthic diversity and communities
  • Stable isotope analysis
  • Phycology and invertebrate ecology
  • Shallow water ecology and deep-sea biology
  • Polar marine biology

Full Profile
Seth Danielson

Seth Danielson

Co-Principal Investigator

Associate Professor


Specialties
:

  • Continental shelf circulation processes
  • Data processing and analysis
  • Atmosphere-ocean interactions

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Russell Hopcroft

Russell Hopcroft

Co-Principal Investigator

Chair, Department of Oceanography and Professor


Specialties
:

  • trophodynamics
  • midwater ecology
  • zooplankton
  • Arctic and subarctic ecosystems

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Franz Mueter

Franz Mueter

Co-Principal Investigator

Professor


Specialties
:

  • climate effects on fish populations
  • dynamics of exploited populations
  • ecosystem oceanography
  • quantitative ecology
  • marine fisheries
  • multivariate analyses
  • population ecology
  • biostatistics
  • fisheries management

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Bodil Bluhm

Bodil Bluhm

Co-Principal Investigator

Affiliate Faculty


Specialties
:

  • Benthic and sea ice community ecology and biodiversity
  • Trophic interactions and population dynamics of polar marine invertebrates
  • Arctic ecosystem synthesis
  • Arctic shelf and deep sea habitats

 

Co-Principal Investigators

Jacqueline Grebmeier, University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, Chesapeake Biological Laboratory, jgrebmei@umces.edu

Lee Cooper, University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, Chesapeake Biological Laboratory, cooper@cbl.umces.edu

Kate Stafford, University of Washington, Applied Physics Laboratory, stafford@apl.washington.edu

Sue Moore, NOAA, sue.moore@noaa.gov

Kathy Kuletz, USFWS, Kathy_Kuletz@fws.gov

 

Research Staff

Ann-Christine Zinkann, UAF, azinkann@alaska.edu

Lorena Edenfield, UAF, leedenfield@alaska.edu