Assessing Status and Trends of Habitats, Key Species and Ecosystems in the Southern Ocean

This conference will bring together Antarctic marine scientists to showcase the work of an international and dynamic community. With a broad emphasis on status and trends of ecosystems throughout the Southern Ocean, the conference will highlight work across several core themes, and focus on how the research will contribute to future IPCC assessments, state of environment reporting for management bodies and other global initiatives. It represents a core activity of ICED (Integrating Climate and Ecosystem Dynamics in the Southern Ocean), a partner programme of IMBER and SCAR.

Themes:

1. Assessments of status and trends in habitats, species and ecosystems
2. Responses of species to changing habitats, including ocean acidification, sea ice and temperature;
3. Modelling and analytical methods to assess status and trends; and
4. Implementation of observing systems to estimate dynamics and change, including benchmarking.

The four themes of the conference aim to facilitate contributions of the Antarctic marine science community to the next assessment by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and recent initiatives to assess status and trends in global ocean ecosystems. It also aims to make a significant contribution to the development of Theme 6 (Biology) of the Southern Ocean Observing System and for updating the SCAR Report on Antarctic Climate Change and the Environment. The outcomes of the conference are also expected to provide significant input to the Committee for Environment Protection (Antarctic Treaty System), the Scientific Committee for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources, the International Whaling Commission’s Scientific Committee and other organisations interested in the management and conservation of Southern Ocean ecosystems. This work is also central to many science groups across ICED, SOOS, and many of the SCAR groups.

Abstract submission deadline extended to 15th December 2017.

For full details, visit the MEASO 2018 website.