BLUE FUTURES, Blue Opportunities from the future: knowledge and tools to inform sustainable growth for an integrated terrestrial, coastal and marine zone economy

Blue Opportunities from the Future is a collaborative project co-designed between the University of East Anglia, Blue Ltd., the New Anglia Local Enterprise Partnership, Coastal Partnership East, the Environment Agency, Orbis Energy and the RSPB. The project is driven by a desire to make better use of NERC funded research in coastal and marine environments to drive innovation and forward thinking in the delivery of future sustainable management and economic growth. East Anglia is already a centre for delivering advances in this area through its research organisations, forward-thinking local authorities, active wildlife conservation organisations and the Green Economy Pathfinder initiative of the New Anglia Local Enterprise Partnership. This project provides a timely opportunity to broaden regional good practice by taking a more marine-facing view. In the East Anglian region there is growing interest among the institutions involved in planning for the coast and marine sectors in taking a more integrated and opportunity-focused look at the long-term future of our environment. This is driven by a recognition of inevitable on-going coastal change and the potential for significant future changes, for example due to global warming and rising sea level. There is a need to think creatively, adaptively and in an inclusive manner, and to consider future change as an opportunity to 'do better'. By connecting the coastal and offshore zones, and working from a bespoke set of 100 year futures scenarios, this project takes a novel and positive approach to thinking about the future of coastal and marine environments in an integrated way. We are undertaking an innovative futures analysis to 2115 to explore the potential future opportunities, spanning land and sea, for East Anglia's 'Blue' economy. We are co-creating a 'Blue Futures toolkit' of methods and associated knowledge base with which project partners can go on to develop a Blue pathfinder for the region to help drive sustainable blue economic growth. This will provide an exemplar approach that will be disseminated to end-users in other regions in the UK, EU and worldwide. The project is drawing upon many aspects of the extensive portfolio of NERC funded and related work at UEA, Cefas, partner organisations and beyond, from ecosystem service valuations (natural capital), to marine biogeochemistry. UEA is well placed to deliver novel creative thinking on future opportunities for sustainable growth, with extensive experience of research into the long-term sustainable futures of complex environments and the impacts of environmental change on economies and society. Integration of our partner groups within the project ensures our work is targeted appropriately and beneficially to maximise utility for the development of sustainable management by local and national bodies throughout the UK and beyond. Planned Impact Participation, knowledge exchange and co-creation of outputs with project partners, stakeholders and end-users is inherently embedded in this project. Combining evidence from NERC science with the expertise of our partners to develop a creative, free-ranging, long-term vision for the future, will result in the production of relevant, targeted information, which addresses real world challenges. This vision will be applied to the multi-way creation of a practical toolkit of solutions (Blue Futures Toolkit) directly relevant to our end-users, and the development of an exemplar Blue Economy Pathfinder plan, providing opportunities for all interested parties. This interaction will be strengthened through a dedicated dissemination and real-world decision-making work package. Primary project stakeholders were consulted during our proposal design and see benefit from the following innovative project features: 1) It takes an integrated view of the terrestrial, coastal and offshore zones, which tend to be managed and researched as separate entities. 2) It applies generically applicable concepts and approaches to a real case location to generate solutions, which will have local, regional and national relevance and transferability. 3) It situates an exploratory, futurescaping research exercise within a practical context, by working to a 100 year timeframe alongside partners concerned with the management and delivery of long term sustainable coastal and marine development. The networks, communication channels and professional impact building expertise of UEA's Marine Knowledge Exchange Network (M-KEN) will be utilised in this project to ensure maximum impact is derived from this projects outputs. Impact delivery will be facilitated by M-KEN's strong network of over 950 stakeholders (43% Policy/3rd Sector, 34% Business, 23% Research), including excellent links with UK policy/implementation bodies (it recently provided evidence to the House of Lords) and industry with international commercial interests (e.g. Gardline, Crown Estate). New stakeholders will be identified by an ongoing stakeholder mapping exercise linking to the M-KEN stakeholder database. Promotion of the project from the outset through to completion and beyond will be via social media, the M-KEN newsletter and website (marineknowledge.org.uk), and M-KEN partner channels (e.g. Tyndall Centre, InnovateUK, Cefas, UEA Research) and through regular M-KEN events. For example, the 'M-KEN Futures' event in March 2015, where 100 stakeholders participated, including marine survey companies (Gardline Environmental, Fugro), policy, implementing and marine monitoring bodies (Cefas, Natural England, JNCC, MMO, EA), data managers from Crown Estate and EMODNet and representatives of the Satellite Applications Catapult/InnovateUK. This will maximise the opportunity for participants to engage with the two-way research and decision making process. These channels will also be used for dissemination of the project outputs (Blue Futures Toolkit, framework for a Blue Economy Pathfinder) to a wide audience. With the strong partnerships involved we are confident that the work undertaken here will lead to measurable change in the way decisions are taken in the region and beyond, better informed by a vision of the options and opportunities of the future. From a local authority to a European scale this project will produce end-user designed tools and knowledge with NERC science at the core

Determining how functionally diverse intertidal sediment species preserve mudflat ecosystem properties after abrupt biodiversity loss

As a result of anthropogenic climate change, extreme climatic events have increased in frequency, severity, and longevity. The consequences for community structure after a catastrophic event have been well studied. However, changes in ecosystem functioning that occur after such an event, including ecosystemrecovery, are still uncertain. A catastrophic event was simulated in an intertidalsedimentary habitat. Postevent sediment replicates were assigned to one of four recovery scenarios: (1) no recovery, (2) migration recovery, and recovery by differential opportunistic colonisation by (3) the polychaete worm Hediste diversicolor and (4) the mud snail Peringia ulvae, two locally dominant infauna species. These are compared with a control scenario not subjected to the event. The simulated extreme event caused a shift in habitat state due to a reduction in mobile macrofauna abundance and an increase in microphytobenthos biomass. Migratory recovery of species and the simulated opportunistic expansion of a single species ameliorated this shift and, for some metrics, functional compensation for the loss of other species and the preservation of certain ecosystem functions was observed. The dominant species identity during postevent habitat recovery can have considerable effects on important ecosystem processes and functions with consequences that may result in functional regime shifts in a habitat and alter coastal stability

Blue Opportunities from the future: Knowledge and tools to inform sustainable growth for an integrated terrestrial, coastal and marine zone economy - a summary report

<div> <div> <div> <p><b>This summary brochure presents highlights of the ‘Blue Opportunities from the Future’ project.</b></p><p><b><br></b></p><p><b>When referencing this report, please use the following citation: Day, S.A., Tolhurst, T.J., Lorenzoni, I., Johnson, M.J., Kennedy, K., Dunnett, I., Forster, J., Goodli e,<br> R., Luisetti, T., Mengo, E., Moore, K., Parker, B., Reynolds, J., Rickards, S., and Southern, A. (2018) Blue Opportunities from the future: Knowledge and tools to inform sustainable growth for an integrated terrestrial, coastal and marine zone economy – a summary report. Marine Knowledge Exchange Network (MKEN), School of Environmental Sciences, University of East Anglia, Norwich. </b></p><p><b>This project was funded by the Natural Environment Research Council (grant NE/ N017323/1) and the Economic and Social Research Council, via Impact Accelerator support to the University of East Anglia. </b></p><p><b><br></b></p><p><b>PROJECT PARTNERS: </b><br></p><p><b>Blue Ltd.<br> CEFAS<br> Coastal Partnership East<br> Environment Agency<br> New Anglia Local Enterprise Partnership OrbisEnergy<br> RSPB and The Landscape Partnership </b></p><p><br></p><p><br></p><p><b>We thank our project partners and participants for contributing their insights, knowledge and expertise to this research. </b></p><br></div> </div> </div

Microplastics and seafood: lower trophic organisms at highest risk of contamination

Microplastic debris is a prevalent global pollutant that poses a risk to marine organisms and ecological processes. It is also suspected to pose a risk to marine food security; however, these risks are currently poorly understood. In this review, we seek to understand the current knowledge pertaining to the contamination of commercially important fished and farmed marine organisms with microplastics, with the aim of answering the question “Does microplastic pollution pose a risk to marine food security?“. A semi-systematic review of studies investigating the number of microplastics found in commercially important organisms of different trophic levels suggests that microplastics do not biomagnify, and that organisms at lower trophic levels are more likely to contaminated by microplastic pollution than apex predators. We address the factors that influence microplastic consumption and retention by organisms. This research has implications for food safety and highlights the risks of microplastics to fisheries and aquaculture, and identifies current knowledge gaps within this research field

The effect of shading and nutrient addition on the microphytobenthos, macrofauna, and biogeochemical properties of intertidal flat sediments

Proliferation of urban structures and mangrove forests in estuaries are altering the shading of intertidal sediments. Urbanization also tends to increase nutrient loads in estuaries, which can have numerous direct and indirect effects on estuarine flora and fauna. Mangrove canopy shades the sediment and provides nutrients to the ecosystem via leaf litter. Microphytobenthos, macrofauna, sediment erodibility, and various biogeochemical properties of sediments have been shown to differ significantly between unshaded intertidal sediment and nearby sediment under a mangrove canopy. This study tested the effects of experimental manipulation of shading and addition of nutrients on the microphytobenthos, macrofauna, sediment erodibility, and selected biogeochemical properties of exposed intertidal flat next to the seaward edge of a mangrove forest. In the first of two experiments, plots were shaded with roofs to give lightly shaded plots and heavily shaded plots, for comparison with unshaded control plots; nutrients were added in an orthogonal design. Sediment and benthos were sampled after 2 weeks. Nutrients were omitted in the second experiment, with plots sampled after 2 weeks or approximately 3 months. The only effect of nutrients was a small negative effect on chlorophyll a and colloidal carbohydrate. Light shading (clear roofs) generally increased measures of microphytobenthos biomass (e.g., F o and chlorophyll a) and biogeochemical properties associated with microphytobenthos such as colloidal carbohydrate. Heavy shading (black roofs) generally decreased measures of microphytobenthos biomass and microphytobenthos-associated biogeochemical properties. Effects on the fauna were much smaller and inconsistent with previous studies, after 3 months, assemblages were different under heavy shading compared to light shading and unshaded control plots, with differences primarily driven by changes in the oligochaetes. Natural or anthropogenic changes in shading at larger spatial scales are likely therefore to directly and indirectly change microphytobenthos, sediment properties, macrofauna and hence ecosystem functions; but any flow-on effects to the fauna are difficult to predict without further experiments to understand the indirect and direct responses of fauna to changing microphytobenthos and properties of intertidal sediment

Detection and characterisation of microplastics and microfibres in fishmeal and soybean meal

Aquaculture is an increasingly important source of nutrition for global food security, which is reliant on animal- and plant-based feeds. Anthropogenic particles, including microplastics and semi-synthetic cellulosic fibres, are prolific marine pollutants that are readily consumed by marine organisms, including small pelagic fish commonly used in fishmeal. Conversely, there is no indication plants can accumulate anthropogenic microparticles. We explore whether aquaculture feed presents a route of contamination for farmed fish. Commercially-sourced aquaculture feedstocks, including fishmeals and soybean meal, were processed (KOH digestion and ZnCl2 density separation) and anthropogenic particles characterised using microscopy and spectroscopic methods. Both fishmeal and soybean meals contained anthropogenic particles, with concentrations ranging 1070–2000 particles kg−1. The prevalence of anthropogenic particles in plant-based feeds indicates that the majority of contamination occurs post-harvest. Based on our findings, farmed Atlantic salmon may be exposed to a minimum of 1788–3013 anthropogenic particles from aquaculture feed across their commercial lifespan

Microplastic shape influences fate in vegetated wetlands

Coastal areas are prone to plastic accumulation due to their proximity to land based sources. Coastal vegetated habitats (e.g., seagrasses, saltmarshes, mangroves) provide a myriad of ecosystem functions, such as erosion protection, habitat refuge, and carbon storage. The biological and physical factors that underlie these functions may provide an additional benefit: trapping of marine microplastics. While microplastics occurrence in coastal vegetated sediments is well documented, there is conflicting evidence on whether the presence of vegetation enhances microplastics trapping relative to bare sites and the factors that influence microplastic trapping remain understudied. We investigated how vegetation structure and microplastic type influences trapping in a simulated coastal wetland. Through a flume experiment, we measured the efficiency of microplastic trapping in the presence of branched and grassy vegetation and tested an array of microplastics that differ in shape, size, and polymer. We observed that the presence of vegetation did not affect the number of microplastics trapped but did affect location of deposition. Microplastic shape, rather than polymer, was the dominant factor in determining whether microplastics were retained in the sediment or adhered to the vegetation canopy. Across the canopy, microfibre concentrations decreased from the leading edge to the interior which suggests that even on a small-scale, vegetation has a filtering effect. The outcome of this study enriches our understanding of coastal vegetation as a microplastics sink and that differences among microplastics informs where they are most likely to accumulate within a biogenic canopy

Impact of polyester and cotton microfibers on growth and sublethal biomarkers in juvenile mussels

Anthropogenic microfibres are a prevalent, persistent and globally distributed form of marine debris. Evidence of microfibre ingestion has been demonstrated in a range of organisms, including Mytilus spp. (mussels), but the extent of any impacts on these organisms are poorly understood. This study investigates, for the first time, the effect of exposing juvenile mussels to polyester and cotton microfibres at environmentally relevant concentrations (both current and predicted future scenarios) over a chronic timescale (94 days). Sublethal biomarkers included growth rate, respiration rate and clearance rate. Mussels were exposed to polyester (median length 149 µm) and cotton (median length 132 µm) microfibres in three treatments: polyester (~ 8 fibres L−1), polyester (~ 80 fibres L−1) and cotton (~ 80 fibres L−1). Mussels exposed to 80 polyester or cotton microfibres L−1 exhibited a decrease in growth rate of 35.6% (polyester) and 18.7% (cotton), with mussels exposed to ~ 80 polyester microfibres L−1 having a significantly lower growth rate than the control population (P < 0.05). This study demonstrates that polyester microfibres have the potential to adversely impact upon mussel growth rates in realistic future scenarios, which may have compounding effects throughout the marine ecosystem and implications for commercial viability

Genomic epidemiology of SARS-CoV-2 in a UK university identifies dynamics of transmission

AbstractUnderstanding SARS-CoV-2 transmission in higher education settings is important to limit spread between students, and into at-risk populations. In this study, we sequenced 482 SARS-CoV-2 isolates from the University of Cambridge from 5 October to 6 December 2020. We perform a detailed phylogenetic comparison with 972 isolates from the surrounding community, complemented with epidemiological and contact tracing data, to determine transmission dynamics. We observe limited viral introductions into the university; the majority of student cases were linked to a single genetic cluster, likely following social gatherings at a venue outside the university. We identify considerable onward transmission associated with student accommodation and courses; this was effectively contained using local infection control measures and following a national lockdown. Transmission clusters were largely segregated within the university or the community. Our study highlights key determinants of SARS-CoV-2 transmission and effective interventions in a higher education setting that will inform public health policy during pandemics.</jats:p