JPR Advance Access published online on October 5, 2005
Journal of Plankton Research, doi:10.1093/plankt/fbi076
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1 National Oceanography Centre Southampton, University of Southampton, Waterfront Campus, Southampton, SO14 3ZH, UK
* To whom correspondence should be addressed. Biogeochemical cycling in marine systems is intimately linked to the activity of specific plankton functional types (PFTs) such as diatoms, coccolithophores and nitrogen fixers, thereby providing a focus for contemporary modelling studies. Incorporating extra complexity beyond simple nutrient-phytoplankton-zooplankton-detritus (NPZD) models is however fraught with difficulties: poorly understood ecology; lack of data; aggregating diversity within functional groups into meaningful state variables and constants; sensitivity of output to the parameterisations in question and their physical and chemical environment. Although regional models addressing the seasonal succession of plankton types have achieved some degree of success, predicted distributions of PFTs in global biogeochemical models have thus far been less than convincing. While the continued articulation of detail in ecosystem models is surely the way forward, I argue that this can only be so with due care and attention to the formulations employed and a healthy dose of scepticism regarding model outcomes. Future directions should emphasise building up complexity gradually, objective assessment of the resulting parameterisations, and variety in approach such as the use of empirical alternatives to the fully dynamic representation of PFTs in models.
Received July 12, 2005
Accepted September 28, 2005
Horizons
Plankton functional type modelling: running before we can walk?
Thomas R. Anderson, E-mail: tra{at}noc.soton.ac.uk
Abstract
Communicating Editor: KJ Flynn
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