Project Title:

‘Marine Sediments and seafloor nutrient cycling in a changing Arctic’ 

Description:

I will be using reactive-transport models (RTMs) to look into benthic recycling fluxes from Arctic shelf sediments, in order to identify the most important controls on the timing and magnitude of these fluxes under changing environmental conditions. My work is integrated with the Changing Arctic Ocean Seafloor (ChAOS) project research group, working as part of the NERC-funded Chanaging Arctic Ocean (CAO) initiative. The Arctic Ocean is subject to strong seasonal to long-term fluctuations in a number of factors, including: sea-ice extent, temperature, bottom water conditions, deposition fluxes and bioturbation. I will be exploring the benthic response to fluctuations in both the seasonal and climate-relevant timescales through comprehensive sensitivity studies using RTMs, but I will also be generating geochemical records from samples collected in the field in order to carry out a data-model comparison study.