Award: OCE-1760463

Large-scale natural disasters such as hurricanes often cause ecological, economic and social disruption in the U.S. Rapid response to hurricanes, and subsequent assessments and restorations of ecosystem functions require baselines of key ecological processes. This project documented and explored the role of pelagic communities and hydrographic conditions in the areas often affected by hurricanes in understanding of flood related damages and the recovery of estuarine ecosystems. During the project, twelve post-storm sampling cruises were conducted in Galveston Bay plus three sampling cruises completed off Texas coast. A year-round monthly time series of zooplankton, water temperature, salinity, and Chl-a was truly first generated in the study areas. A framework of assessing the short-term and long-term responses of pelagic communities to the extreme flooding from hurricanes and estimating the subsequent recovery was developed. Data gaps linking the inshore and offshore pelagic communities in response to hurricanes were partly filled. Progresses of the project were communicated at national conferences and local meetings to the research community, state and government agencies. In addition to research communities, the project outcome has significant potential for agencies, police planners and resource managers to evaluate damages, implications and restorations of estuarine ecosystems after natural disasters. Outcomes relevant to Intellectual Merit: The year-round monthly dataset of zooplankton and hydrographic conditions generated during the project was the first truly time series in the study areas, which is valuable to examine the short-term and long-term changes in pelagic communities after natural disasters. In the last decade, two major hurricanes (Ike in 2008 and Harvey in 2017) have affected the study areas. Data collected from this project and the historic data collected in 2008 provided a unique opportunity to test the resilience of estuarine ecosystems in response to the storm surge of hurricane Ike and extreme floods of hurricane Harvey. The successful outcome of this work will ultimately be the first systematic estuarine research framework, which would be conductive to how we prepare and assess the aftermath of natural disasters in the future. Outcomes relevant to Broader Impacts: As for the impact of hurricanes on pelagic communities, results of the project were disseminated at multiple regional and national conferences. The PI was invited to present the project findings to the local research community and state agencies from different groups of potential customers. Two graduate students, two undergraduate students and an underrepresented REU student received training with the PI. Multiple research laboratories and many graduate and undergraduate students from other institutions were involved in the sampling cruises on collecting valuable data to multidisciplinarily study estuarine ecosystems. Last Modified: 10/01/2019 Submitted by: Hui Liu