About FEO Section

Ocean provides variety of benefits, including fish, shellfish and seaweed,and sustains human living. Recently, many studies showed the importance of climate and ocean variability on the fluctuation of living marine resources. For example, it has been elucidated that the large fluctuation of Japanese sardine closely related to the ocean environments in the Kuroshio and Kuroshio Extension, where their eggs and larvae are advected. However, life history of many marine livings (spawning ground, migration route, etc.) is still unknown and the mechanism of ocean variability impacts on living marine resources is still mystery. Facing to the global change, it is urgent task for human beings to elucidate the mechanism of ocean variability impacts on marine ecosystems and evaluate the effect of future climate change on living marine resources. Our group studies the dynamics of physical oceanographic processes and their impacts on marine ecosystem and fisheries resources via physical-biological interactions by promoting both field observations and numerical simulations. We are conducting high technical observations using underwater gliders and GPS wave buoys and investigating sardine larval environments using stable isotope. Relationship between ocean environments and occurrence of paralytic shellfish poisoning is studied with real-time buoy monitoring of Otsuchi Bay. To elucidate the key factors to control fluctuations of living marine resources and evaluate climate change effects on them, data assimilated marine ecosystem models and fish growth - migration models have been developed.

Ongoing Research Themes

Fluctuation and species alternation mechanism of important living marine resources
Impacts of global warming on marine ecosystem and fluctuation in living marine resources
Physical processes related to biogeochemical cycles in the Kuroshio and its adjacent regions
Transport modeling of harmful organisms and toxic substances
Development of new-generation observation system and marine ecosystem models