| 1. |
- Donis, Daphne, et al.
(author)
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Stratification strength and light climate explain variation in chlorophyll a at the continental scale in a European multilake survey in a heatwave summer
- 2021
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In: Limnology and Oceanography. - : John Wiley & Sons. - 0024-3590 .- 1939-5590. ; 66:12, s. 4314-4333
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- To determine the drivers of phytoplankton biomass, we collected standardized morphometric, physical, and biological data in 230 lakes across the Mediterranean, Continental, and Boreal climatic zones of the European continent. Multilinear regression models tested on this snapshot of mostly eutrophic lakes (median total phosphorus [TP] = 0.06 and total nitrogen [TN] = 0.7 mg L-1), and its subsets (2 depth types and 3 climatic zones), show that light climate and stratification strength were the most significant explanatory variables for chlorophyll a (Chl a) variance. TN was a significant predictor for phytoplankton biomass for shallow and continental lakes, while TP never appeared as an explanatory variable, suggesting that under high TP, light, which partially controls stratification strength, becomes limiting for phytoplankton development. Mediterranean lakes were the warmest yet most weakly stratified and had significantly less Chl a than Boreal lakes, where the temperature anomaly from the long-term average, during a summer heatwave was the highest (+4 degrees C) and showed a significant, exponential relationship with stratification strength. This European survey represents a summer snapshot of phytoplankton biomass and its drivers, and lends support that light and stratification metrics, which are both affected by climate change, are better predictors for phytoplankton biomass in nutrient-rich lakes than nutrient concentrations and surface temperature.
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| 2. |
- Doubek, Jonathan P., et al.
(author)
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The extent and variability of storm-induced temperature changes in lakes measured with long-term and high-frequency data
- 2021
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In: Limnology and Oceanography. - : John Wiley & Sons. - 0024-3590 .- 1939-5590. ; 66:5, s. 1979-1992
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- The intensity and frequency of storms are projected to increase in many regions of the world because of climate change. Storms can alter environmental conditions in many ecosystems. In lakes and reservoirs, storms can reduce epilimnetic temperatures from wind-induced mixing with colder hypolimnetic waters, direct precipitation to the lake's surface, and watershed runoff. We analyzed 18 long-term and high-frequency lake datasets from 11 countries to assess the magnitude of wind- vs. rainstorm-induced changes in epilimnetic temperature. We found small day-to-day epilimnetic temperature decreases in response to strong wind and heavy rain during stratified conditions. Day-to-day epilimnetic temperature decreased, on average, by 0.28 degrees C during the strongest windstorms (storm mean daily wind speed among lakes: 6.7 +/- 2.7 m s(-1), 1 SD) and by 0.15 degrees C after the heaviest rainstorms (storm mean daily rainfall: 21.3 +/- 9.0 mm). The largest decreases in epilimnetic temperature were observed >= 2 d after sustained strong wind or heavy rain (top 5(th) percentile of wind and rain events for each lake) in shallow and medium-depth lakes. The smallest decreases occurred in deep lakes. Epilimnetic temperature change from windstorms, but not rainstorms, was negatively correlated with maximum lake depth. However, even the largest storm-induced mean epilimnetic temperature decreases were typically <2 degrees C. Day-to-day temperature change, in the absence of storms, often exceeded storm-induced temperature changes. Because storm-induced temperature changes to lake surface waters were minimal, changes in other limnological variables (e.g., nutrient concentrations or light) from storms may have larger impacts on biological communities than temperature changes.
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| 3. |
- Engel, Fabian
(author)
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The role of freshwater phytoplankton in the global carbon cycle
- 2020
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Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic)abstract
- Water flowing through the landscape transports chemical substances including carbon. Along the way from upland soils to the ocean, carbon is transformed from organic carbon into inorganic carbon and vice versa. One such carbon transformation process is the uptake of carbon dioxide (CO2) from the water phase by phytoplankton. For some inland waters, it has been shown that phytoplankton can significantly reduce the amount of CO2 (measured as partial pressure of CO2, pCO2) in the water phase. However, the importance of this process for carbon budgets on a regional and global scale is not yet known.The aim of this thesis was to investigate the importance of CO2 uptake by phytoplankton for CO2 dynamics in lakes and rivers on a regional and global scale, and to explain its spatial variation. Conceptual models and the analysis of monitoring data together with statistical modeling and meta-analyses were used.Combining a conceptual lake model for carbon transformation with a mass balance approach showed that gross primary production in lakes is an important flux in the global dissolved inorganic carbon budget of inland waters. In a next step, a simple proxy to assess the phytoplankton influence on the pCO2 in individual lakes and rivers was tested and applied on a regional and global scale. The analysis showed that a significant pCO2 reduction by phytoplankton could be expected in about 20% to 40% of lakes in the temperate and sub-/tropical region. In 9% of the Swedish lakes analyzed, the proxy indicated a significant pCO2 reduction by phytoplankton during summer. The pCO2 can also be significantly reduced by phytoplankton in rivers, and such a reduction might occur in about 20% of the temperate rivers on Earth. In a temperate river that was studied in more detail, consecutive impoundments were found to stimulate phytoplankton production, which might be one explanation for a greater phytoplankton influence on the pCO2 in such systems.Taken together, these results suggest that CO2 uptake by phytoplankton is a significant flux in the global CO2 budget of inland waters. The importance of CO2 uptake by phytoplankton for CO2 dynamics in individual lakes and rivers was predictable by easily available water physico-chemical and biological variables and varied widely in relation to environmental conditions.
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| 4. |
- Grant, Luke, et al.
(author)
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Attribution of global lake systems change to anthropogenic forcing
- 2021
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In: Nature Geoscience. - : Springer Nature. - 1752-0894 .- 1752-0908. ; 14:11, s. 849-854
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Lake ecosystems are jeopardized by the impacts of climate change on ice seasonality and water temperatures. Yet historical simulations have not been used to formally attribute changes in lake ice and temperature to anthropogenic drivers. In addition, future projections of these properties are limited to individual lakes or global simulations from single lake models. Here we uncover the human imprint on lakes worldwide using hindcasts and projections from five lake models. Reanalysed trends in lake temperature and ice cover in recent decades are extremely unlikely to be explained by pre-industrial climate variability alone. Ice-cover trends in reanalysis are consistent with lake model simulations under historical conditions, providing attribution of lake changes to anthropogenic climate change. Moreover, lake temperature, ice thickness and duration scale robustly with global mean air temperature across future climate scenarios (+0.9 °C °Cair–1, –0.033 m °Cair–1 and –9.7 d °Cair–1, respectively). These impacts would profoundly alter the functioning of lake ecosystems and the services they provide.
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| 5. |
- Guo, Mingyang, et al.
(author)
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Validation and Sensitivity Analysis of a 1-D Lake Model Across Global Lakes
- 2021
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In: Journal of Geophysical Research - Atmospheres. - : American Geophysical Union (AGU). - 2169-897X .- 2169-8996. ; 126:4
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Lakes have important influence on weather and climate from local to global scales. However, their prediction using numerical models is notoriously difficult because lakes are highly heterogeneous across the globe, but observations are sparse. Here, we assessed the performance of a 1‐D lake model in simulating the thermal structures of 58 lakes with diverse morphometric and geographic characteristics by following the phase 2a local lake protocol of the Intersectoral Impact Model Intercomparison Project (ISIMIP2a). After calibration, the root‐mean‐square errors (RMSE) were below 2°C for 70% and 75% of the lakes for epilimnion and full‐profile temperature simulations, with an average of 1.71°C and 1.43°C, respectively. The model performance mainly depended on lake shape rather than location, supporting the possibility of grouping model parameters by lake shape for global applications. Furthermore, through machine‐learning based parameter sensitivity tests, we identified turbulent heat fluxes, wind‐driven mixing, and water transparency as the major processes controlling lake thermal and mixing regimes. Snow density was also important for modeling the ice phenology of high‐latitude lakes. The relative influence of the key processes and the corresponding parameters mainly depended on lake latitude and depth. Turbulent heat fluxes showed a decreasing importance in affecting epilimnion temperature with increasing latitude. Wind‐driven mixing was less influential to lake stratification for deeper lakes while the impact of light extinction, on the contrary, showed a positive correlation with lake depth. Our findings may guide improvements in 1‐D lake model parameterizations to achieve higher fidelity in simulating global lake thermal dynamics.
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| 6. |
- Hrycik, Allison R., et al.
(author)
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Earlier winter/spring runoff and snowmelt during warmer winters lead to lower summer chlorophyll-a in north temperate lakes
- 2021
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In: Global Change Biology. - : John Wiley & Sons. - 1354-1013 .- 1365-2486. ; 27:19, s. 4615-4629
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Winter conditions, such as ice cover and snow accumulation, are changing rapidly at northern latitudes and can have important implications for lake processes. For example, snowmelt in the watershed—a defining feature of lake hydrology because it delivers a large portion of annual nutrient inputs—is becoming earlier. Consequently, earlier and a shorter duration of snowmelt are expected to affect annual phytoplankton biomass. To test this hypothesis, we developed an index of runoff timing based on the date when 50% of cumulative runoff between January 1 and May 31 had occurred. The runoff index was computed using stream discharge for inflows, outflows, or for flows from nearby streams for 41 lakes in Europe and North America. The runoff index was then compared with summer chlorophyll-a (Chl-a) concentration (a proxy for phytoplankton biomass) across 5–53 years for each lake. Earlier runoff generally corresponded to lower summer Chl-a. Furthermore, years with earlier runoff also had lower winter/spring runoff magnitude, more protracted runoff, and earlier ice-out. We examined several lake characteristics that may regulate the strength of the relationship between runoff timing and summer Chl-a concentrations; however, our tested covariates had little effect on the relationship. Date of ice-out was not clearly related to summer Chl-a concentrations. Our results indicate that ongoing changes in winter conditions may have important consequences for summer phytoplankton biomass and production.
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| 7. |
- Jane, Stephen F., et al.
(author)
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Widespread deoxygenation of temperate lakes
- 2021
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In: Nature. - : Springer Nature. - 0028-0836 .- 1476-4687. ; 594:7861, s. 66-70
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- The concentration of dissolved oxygen in aquatic systems helps to regulate biodiversity(1,2), nutrient biogeochemistry(3), greenhouse gas emissions(4), and the quality of drinking water(5). The long-term declines in dissolved oxygen concentrations in coastal and ocean waters have been linked to climate warming and human activity(6,7), but little is known about the changes in dissolved oxygen concentrations in lakes. Although the solubility of dissolved oxygen decreases with increasing water temperatures, long-term lake trajectories are difficult to predict. Oxygen losses in warming lakes may be amplified by enhanced decomposition and stronger thermal stratification(8,9) or oxygen may increase as a result of enhanced primary production(10). Here we analyse a combined total of 45,148 dissolved oxygen and temperature profiles and calculate trends for 393 temperate lakes that span 1941 to 2017. We find that a decline in dissolved oxygen is widespread in surface and deep-water habitats. The decline in surface waters is primarily associated with reduced solubility under warmer water temperatures, although dissolved oxygen in surface waters increased in a subset of highly productive warming lakes, probably owing to increasing production of phytoplankton. By contrast, the decline in deep waters is associated with stronger thermal stratification and loss of water clarity, but not with changes in gas solubility. Our results suggest that climate change and declining water clarity have altered the physical and chemical environment of lakes. Declines in dissolved oxygen in freshwater are 2.75 to 9.3 times greater than observed in the world's oceans(6,7) and could threaten essential lake ecosystem services(2,3,5,11).
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| 8. |
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| 9. |
- Mesman, Jorrit P., 1993-
(author)
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Assessing future effects on lake ecosystem resilience using data analysis and dynamic modelling : Modelling the effects of extreme weather events and climate warming on lakes
- 2021
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Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic)abstract
- Extreme weather events can have short-term and long-term effects on lake thermal structure, nutrient dynamics, and community composition. Moreover, changes in lake variables induced by global climate change may influence the response and recovery of lake ecosystems to extreme weather events. The linkage between extreme weather and lakes includes interactions between physics and biology, and long-term and short-term dynamics, which are not yet well understood. Process-based modelling is used in this thesis to further explore this topic, and to assess how lake responses to extreme weather events may change under the influence of climate warming.Lake-internal feedback mechanisms were shown to potentially cause sudden shifts in climate-induced transitions in lake mixing regimes, with a role for extreme weather events to induce such shifts. Additionally, one-dimensional physical lake models performed well in reproducing trends in lake variables during storms and heatwaves in a study covering multiple locations and models. However, extreme weather events still presented periods of increased model uncertainty, which should be taken into account. A software package was developed to promote the use of ensemble lake modelling, which is one way to include uncertainty in model forecasting efforts. This could be particularly helpful in periods of extreme weather. With tools and theory now in place, a coupled physical-biogeochemical model was then used to assess what are the most important drivers of how lake phytoplankton responds to storms, and how this response might change with climate warming. Storm intensity, thermal structure, nutrients, and light all affected the phytoplankton concentration after storms. Moderate wind speeds had increasing effects compared to high wind speeds, but a sufficiently deep mixed layer reduced the response to wind strongly. Higher nutrients and light promoted increasing effects of wind, and higher temperatures promoted decreasing effects. The response of phytoplankton to storms did not change markedly between present-day and future-climate scenarios.This thesis furthers our understanding of the processes involved in extreme events acting on lakes. A more complete understanding is necessary to develop more reliable models and anticipate future conditions. Furthermore, modelling was shown to be a viable approach to study these events and validation data and tools were provided to increase the reliability of this method. In these times of increasing environmental pressures and changing extreme weather patterns, more insight into future effects of extreme events is much needed.
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| 10. |
- Mesman, Jorrit P., 1993-, et al.
(author)
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Performance of one-dimensional hydrodynamic lake models during short-term extreme weather events
- 2020
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In: Environmental Modelling & Software. - : Elsevier BV. - 1364-8152 .- 1873-6726. ; 133
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Numerical lake models are useful tools to study hydrodynamics in lakes, and are increasingly applied to extreme weather events. However, little is known about the accuracy of such models during these short-term events. We used high-frequency data from three lakes to test the performance of three one-dimensional (1D) hydrodynamic models (Simstrat, GOTM, GLM) during storms and heatwaves. Models reproduced the overall direction and magnitude of changes during the extreme events, with accurate timing and little bias. Changes in volume-averaged and surface temperatures and Schmidt stability were simulated more accurately than changes in bottom temperature, maximum buoyancy frequency, or mixed layer depth. However, in most cases the model error was higher (30-100%) during extreme events compared to reference periods. As a consequence, while 1D lake models can be used to study effects of extreme weather events, the increased uncertainty in the simulations should be taken into account when interpreting results.
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