Workshop

This workshop will build on the results of the grand challenges survey in freshwater science and design a forward-looking research agenda. The workshop seeks to identify the key issues for freshwater ecosystems, synthesize existing understanding to characterize emerging knowledge gaps, and consider the role of cutting edge analytical approaches and emerging methods in informing a near-term research agenda.

Although freshwater is a vital ecological and societal resource, it remains severely threatened by a wide range of human activities and environmental change. Climate change and other human impacts are affecting hydrological and thermal regimes, habitat availability, biodiversity and species invasions, nutrient cycling and hypoxia, algal blooms and inland fisheries production. Furthermore, interactions between the various stressors can lead to unexpected, non-linear responses to environmental change and thus further complicate the development of effective management strategies. This urgency about freshwater resources and their future is widely recognized by aquatic scientists.

The workshop is predicated on the 25th anniversary of the Freshwater Imperative. Twenty-five years ago, concern about sustainable management of freshwater resources led to a group of aquatic scientists to develop The Freshwater Imperative (FWI). The FWI was a comprehensive research agenda designed to lead to a predictive understanding of freshwater ecosystems, through improving detection, assessment, and forecasting, as well as developing management and mitigation scenarios for potential environmental change. A book was published by the same name, and the initiative was also highlighted in Science and in a disciplinary journal.

In this workshop, our goals are to reflect on what aquatic ecologists have accomplished, what we have missed, and what lessons we have learned that can be applied to preparing for future environmental crises. These goals are motivated by the continued and in many cases accelerating degradation of freshwater resources, combined with an explosion of innovative research tools, approaches, and agendas over the past 25 years, many of which were not anticipated by the FWI.

Questions? Email freshwater.imperative@gmail.com or contact any of us with questions!