Category: Partners

Description of the organisation

Nansen Environmental Research Centre India (NERCI) was established in 1999 as a joint venture between Indian and Norwegian partners. It is one of the centres in the Nansen Group. NERCI is a Non-profit research centre (registered as a section 25 company), and is registered as Scientific and Industrial and Research Organisation (SIRO) by Dept. of Scientific and Industrial Research of Ministry of Science and Technology, Govt. of India. It conducts basic and applied research in interdisciplinary research areas in cooperation with Nansen Group, Indian MoU partners and other international associate partners like Plymouth Marine Laboratory (PML), UK; CMCC, Italy; ALTERRA, Netherlands and IFREMER, France. NERCI conducts studies by way of in situ observations, satellite data processing, numerical ocean and climate models. NERCI has a full-fledged bio-optics and modelling lab facility. NERCI promotes PhD scholars and Masters students from India and abroad to conduct research and internship under the guidance of its distinguished scientists. NERCI has staff strength of 16, including 5 permanent scientists and 3 full time doctoral students. It is a recognised research centre of the Kerala University of Fisheries and Ocean Studies (KUFOS), Kerala, where NERCI office is currently functioning.

Expertise particularly relevant for the project

NERCI has acquired meta-data compiled from various sources around the globe which includes quality checked in situ data on parameters like chl-a, primary productivity, nutrients, aerosol, optical parameters and environmental parameters from the Northern Indian Ocean. This could serve as input data for models used in the project to assess variability in primary productivity in the Indian waters.

NERCI scientists have been involved in the monitoring of harmful algal blooms (HABs) for the past 6 years as part of the INDO-MARECLIM (EU-FP7 project), SHABASHI and HABAQUA (POGO-NANO projects) projects. The expertise developed in estimating phytoplankton composition and pigment analysis using HPLC could be used for validation of phytoplankton functional types assessed using remote sensing data; since phytoplankton functional types has direct linkage to ocean biogeochemistry.

NERCI has also worked on the influence of tropical Indian Ocean warming on the chlorophyll concentrations in the north Indian Ocean, especially the sudden fluctuations in primary productivity and increasing occurrence of harmful algal blooms (HABs), as well as the influence of the Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD) on the primary productivity in the eastern Arabian Sea. This expertise will be used in WP2 of COMFORT, to study the HABs in Northern Indian Ocean.

Several studies have been undertaken at NERCI to analyse the Indian summer monsoon variability at annual and decadal time-scales, with work on the variability of coastal upwelling along the west and east coasts of India, the inter-annual and decadal variations in Indian summer monsoon rainfall and its implications on the primary productivity and ecosystem dynamics.

Another area of expertise of NERCI is Oxygen Minimum Zone (OMZ) related studies in the Arabian sea and at present, the implication of OMZ on primary productivity and fishery is being studied as a funded project from Department of Science and Technology (DST), India titled “Impact of the developing hypoxia in the Eastern Arabian Sea Coral reefs are vulnerable ecosystems that suffer the brunt of global warming and ocean acidification”. Coral reefs that act as important sinks of C in the ocean can serve as indicators of the health of the oceans. Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute (ICAR-CMFRI) is one of the scientific collaborators and of NERCI and will contribute remotely sensed data as well as provide additional expertise on coral bleaching for improved understanding of the combined effect of thermal stress and acidification also in relation to further biogeochemical cycles (C, O₂ and N).

For more information please visit NERCI website.

Description of the organisation

SMHI, the Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute, is an expert agency under the Ministry of the Environment and Energy. SMHI is providing decision-support to a broad range of end-users, based on meteorology, hydrology, oceanography and climate information. The institute is responsible for national monitoring and modelling in these fields, data archives and refinement of information for societal needs. SMHI is representing Sweden in relevant international organisations, e.g. ECMWF, WMO, EUMETSAT and IPCC. SMHI is also the host of the International Project Office for CORDEX. The institute has a strong R&D focus with 110 full time scientists, with climate research involving all six research sections, including the Rossby Centre which is a leading partner in the development of EC-Earth Earth System Model. SMHI employs a highly interdisciplinary international staff suitable for successful work in international and interdisciplinary consortia.

Expertise particularly relevant for the project

SMHI is involved in many national and international projects; currently the Rossby Centre and the Oceanography research department are involved in eight H2020 Projects, including CRESCENDO and PRIMAVERA, and the Rossby Centre is currently running Copernicus ‘C3S production of European climate projections’. SMHI is the main coordinator to the Community Earth system model EC-Earth that comprises all relevant compartments for Earth system research and climate change research. SMHI is leading CRESCENDO’s Work Package on knowledge dissemination.

For more information visit SMHI website.

Description of the organisation

The University of Gothenburg (UGOT) was founded as Göteborgs högskola (Gothenburg University College) in 1891. In 1907, it was granted the same status as Uppsala University and Lund University by the Swedish government, thus creating Sweden’s third university. 38 000 students and 6 000 employees make the University a large and inspiring place to work and study, with a continuous flow of new knowledge and ideas. The broad-ranging research at the University of Gothenburg is innovative, characterised by multidisciplinary cooperation, closely linked to education and stands in close contact with society. Our 3000 researchers, teachers and doctoral students span from developmental biology and gender studies to logistics and marine mammals. The University of Gothenburg is environmentally certified and works actively for sustainable development. The Department of Marine Sciences (DMS) at the Faculty of Science brings together research foci within oceanography, geology, chemistry, biology and conservation. This research is carried out both within individual subjects and in larger multidisciplinary projects. The department has a number of nationally unique research fields, with the flagship being our ultra-modern infrastructure for marine research and education, with a brand new 45 meter research vessel, Skagerak, and two modern research stations, Kristineberg (est. 1877) and Tjärnö (est. 1963). This infrastructure gives us unique access to several marine environments, as well as technology, laboratories and instruments that permit research at the highest international class within the field of marine sciences.

Expertise particularly relevant for the project

With close to 40 years of modern polar research, the DMS has a long tradition and strong expertise in polar marine sciences. High-latitude fieldwork, novel analytical method development, and syntheses with emphasis on the marine carbonate system, anthropogenic carbon, and climate change are among the core research themes of the department. Previous research has greatly benefitted from support from several large national, international, and European research programs (see below). These projects have resulted in numerous research publications of high impact factor related to the study of rapidly changing Arctic Ocean and its adjacent marginal seas with a particular focus on ocean acidification and anthropogenic carbon. Since 1980, the marine chemistry research group at DMS has collected and analyzed hydrographic and biogeochemical observations from the deep central Arctic Ocean and the Siberian Shelf Seas within national and international research efforts. Recently, it has been shown that the anthropogenic carbon storage is rapidly changing in the central Arctic Ocean down to at least 1500 m, this, driven by pre-acidified inflowing waters of Atlantic origin (Ulfsbo et al., 2018). The increase in anthropogenic carbon, consecutively leads to ocean acidification which has been shown to increase in all major parts of the Arctic Ocean, from the highly dynamic Siberian Shelf Seas (Anderson et al., 2017a; Semiletov et al., 2016), to the Amerasian (Qi et al., 2017) and Eurasian Basins (Ulfsbo et al., 2018). It is unclear whether the Arctic Ocean, under summer ice- free conditions, will remain a large sink for atmospheric CO2, will become a moderate sink, or that it even will become a CO2 source. It is also unclear whether the Arctic biological pump is enhanced or reduced by the recent loss of sea ice. The outcome will depend on the future changes in primary and net community production (export production) and may vary by region. Our ability to predict the changing character of the Arctic Ocean thus requires a thorough understanding of the current state and processes governing primary and net community production (NCP), in addition to the increasing anthropogenic carbon and ocean acidification (Ulfsbo et al., 2014).

For more information visit UGOT website.

Description of the organisation

From Stockholm University, two units are involved in COMFORT: the Stockholm Resilience Centre (SRC) and the Department of Environmental Science and Analytical Chemistry (ACES). SRC is a trans-disciplinary research centre that advances the understanding of complex social-ecological systems, such as tipping points, and generates new and elaborated insights and means for the development of management and governance practices. SRC has its focus on making a difference for sustainable development by building a world-leading research centre that would take the interdisciplinary research on linked ecological and social systems significant steps forward and provide insights and means for the development of management and governance practices in order to secure ecosystem services.

ACES is a multidisciplinary department that gathers scientists from diverse fields in the natural sciences to study environmental phenomena. The department is very productive and publishing >140 high-impact peer- reviewed papers each year. Environment and Climate is a central priority for SU. The climate change, Arctic and its relationship with large-scale carbon cycles is a centrally defined research area at SU. The QS World Univ Ranking 2016 placed SU as 5th in the World in subject area Environ. Sci. and Engineering.

Expertise particularly relevant for the project

SRC and ACES have been involved in many marine-related and climate related EU projects e.g. ELME, KNOWSEAS, Nunataryuk; BONUS projects (ECOSUPPORT, RECOCA, HYPER, INSPIRE, BLUEWEBS);

NorMER (Nordic Centre for Research on Marine Ecosystems and Resources under Climate Change); and finally SWERUS-C3 (Swedish-Russian-US Arctic Ocean Investigation of Climate-Cryosphere-Carbon Interactions). Prof. Örjan Gustafsson (ACES) has been awarded the prestigious ERC Advanced Grant in Environmental and Geosciences.

ACES has long-term experience in climate-related issues such as carbon cycling, permafrost thawing. The group of Örjan Gustafsson focus in particular on abrupt releases of methane (+CO₂/N₂O) from thawing coastal and subsea permafrost and from collapsing Arctic slope hydrates and their impacts such as ocean acidification.

SRC has long-term experience in system dynamics, the theory of resilience and tipping points, the analysis of abrupt ecosystem change including tipping points using long-term observations and model results. The methodological portfolio of the group includes advanced, non-linear statistical and process modelling approaches. SRC has also long-term experience in synthesising and co-designing research with stakeholders.

For more information visit SU website.

Description of the organisation:

NERSC is an independent non-profit research foundation conducting climate and environmental research funded by research councils, the European Commission, space agencies, national and international government agencies, business and industry, as well as through private donations. The Nansen Center is a national environmental research institute and receives basic funding from the Ministry of Climate and Environment through the Research Council of Norway. As a national climate and environmental research institute the Center has strengthened its expertise through institutional strategic research programs within: 1) – studies of regional climate change, including studies of sea level change and local air quality in urban areas, 2) – operational oceanographic studies and services in the Arctic, focusing on integrating observations and the development of ocean, marine ecosystem/biogeochemistry and sea ice modelling and forecasting, 3) – climate studies with a focus on teleconnections and the coupling between the Arctic and monsoon systems in India and China, 4) – and integrated multidisciplinary climate and environmental research. During 2017, the scientific staff published 65 scientific articles in international peer reviewed journals, one book and three book chapters. In addition, the scientists at the Center published 73 conference proceedings, posters and scientific presentations, 18 technical and other reports, as well as nine communications or chronicles – in total 174 publications in 2017. NERSC contributed to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reports.

Expertise particularly relevant for the project:

NERSC has published peer reviewed papers (Shalin et al., 2018 and Simon et al., 2015) focusing on detection and analysis of biogeochemical provinces based on satellite and TOPAZ ice-ocean-marine ecosystem coupled model products. Dr. Samuelsen co-authored both publications. Dynamical detection of the biogeological provinces out of CMIP model ensemble products requires clustering analysis based on machine learning methods. The Python-base machine learning software package for marine biogeochemical/ecosystem analysis is currently under development in SubMAPP project (2018-2021). NERSC has in-house experts in working with CMIP data for climate change studies and co-hosted CMIP6 data workshop in May 2018. NERSC project manager was leading dynamical downscaling project of CMIP5 ocean future projection products under SI-CAT project (2015-2019) and operational habitat suitable index mapping projects for fishery management under RECCA project (2011-2015) from 2013 to 2017 at Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology (JAMSTEC), Japan.

For more information visit NERSC website.

Description of the organisation

In 2018, Uni Research merged with four other non-profit research institutes to form the Norwegian Research Centre AS (NORCE). Uni Climate will continue to be a self-contained department within the new institute and is now called NORCE Climate. NORCE is a broadly based, multidisciplinary non-profit research institute with 900 highly qualified employees from more than 30 different nations, carrying out research and development in the fields of biotechnology, health, environment, climate, energy and social sciences. Its climate research is run through the department NORCE Climate with particular strengths in understanding the Earth system across multiple spatial and temporal scales, dynamical modelling of the Earth system, and understanding past to future climate variability and change. NORCE Climate has extensive experience in coordinating and leading large national and international projects (e.g., the Norwegian Earth System Modelling Infrastructure project INES, ERC Synergy Grant Ice2Ice, and the Ocean Thematic Centre of ICOS). NORCE is both a partner in the Norwegian Climate Service Centre and one of four partners constituting the Bjerknes Centre for Climate Research, one of Europe’s leading climate research centres.

Expertise particularly relevant for the project

NORCE Climate has an internationally renowned biogeochemical oceanography research group with expertise in both modelling and observing the large-scale biogeochemical state of the ocean. The group is involved in several international data synthesis efforts (GLODAP, SOCAT), and has a leading role in the ICOS Ocean Thematic Centre. The group is maintaining and further developing the ocean biogeochemistry module of the Norwegian Earth System Model (NorESM). Several group members have been involved in designing, producing, and evaluating ESM simulations, both in CMIP5 and in the upcoming CMIP6. The group is involved in previous and ongoing international projects that focus on ESM development and evaluation (e.g. EU-COMBINE, EU-CARBOCHANGE, EU-CRESCENDO) and has an extensive record of publications in these fields. The group has published several papers on modelling and projecting multiple stressors of ocean ecosystems and on constraining ESM projections using observational evidence.

For more information NORCE website.

Description of the organisation

Norwegian Polar Institute (NPI) is Norway’s central governmental institution for scientific research, mapping and environmental monitoring in the Arctic and the Antarctic. The Institute advises Norwegian authorities on matters concerning polar issues, and is Norway’s competent environmental authority in Antarctica. The Norwegian Polar Institute is a directorate under the Ministry of Climate and Environment.

Expertise particularly relevant for the project

NPI as has extensive expertise in observations, monitoring and process studies in the polar regions, in both the Arctic and Antarctica, and has extensive research regarding physical-chemical oceanography, sea ice physics/chemistry, marine biology and glaciology, related to natural processes and climate change. Since 2011, NPI has improved the expertise in the sea ice/ocean carbonate chemistry, air-sea CO₂ exchange, biogeochemical processes and ocean acidification in the Arctic Ocean and Southern Ocean as part of the research program “Ocean Acidification (OA) and effects in northern waters” within the FRAM-High north research centre for Climate and Environment”. NPI has expertise in analytical methods for carbonate chemistry (pCO₂, pH, total alkalinity, and total dissolved inorganic carbon) for data quality control. NPI performs yearly and seasonal expeditions to the Fram Strait/north of Svalbard, and periodically to the Southern Ocean.

For more  information visit NPI website.

 

Description of the organisation

The Institute of Marine Research (IMR) is the largest national research institute of its kind in Europe, with about 1,000 employees with expertise encompassing all aspects of marine science. Our main activities are research, advisory work and monitoring with offices in Bergen, Tromsø and three research stations, laboratories as well as a fleet of research vessels, which are the most important platforms for collecting marine data. The IMR also has several laboratories that analyse the samples taken by its monitoring and research programmes.

Expertise particularly relevant for the project

The research group on ocean acidification started in 2011 as part of the research program “Ocean Acidification and effects in northern waters” within the FRAM-High north research centre for Climate and Environment. The leading scientist in the group has more than 20 years expertise of investigating ocean acidification and carbonate chemistry using field measurements with particular emphasis on the Nordic seas and the polar oceans. The research group has also long-standing expertise within studies of biological effects using both models and laboratory incubations. M. Chierici is dedicated to increase the data coverage in polar oceans for increased knowledge on the current changes that are observed in those regions and the effects on the carbon cycle and the marine environment. Her main interest and expertise is to investigate the major processes controlling the observed changes in carbonate chemistry and the fate of increased CO₂ in the ocean. She has published more than 60 peer-review publications related to this topic. She was one of the first to report on undersaturation of aragonite in the Arctic Ocean, and has contributed with valuable and unique winter marine chemistry data in the Arctic Ocean. M. Chierici is currently leading the national monitoring program for ocean acidification in the Norwegian seas funded by the Environment Agency. She is also a research leader (RF2 Human impacts) in the new Norwegian national project “The Nansen Legacy” from year 2017 to 2023 and is responsible for the studies of carbonate chemistry, and ocean acidification in the Barents Sea. The Nansen Legacy cruises will mainly be on board the new icebreaking research vessel “Kronprins Haakon”.

For more information visit IMR website.

 

Description of the organisation

The University of Bergen (UiB) is an internationally recognised research university with more than 14,500 students and close to 3,500 employees at 7 faculties (website: https://www.uib.no). Yearly around 250 candidates are awarded with a PhD degree. The University is engaged in the European Union’s Framework programmes for research and technological development and has been designated as a European Research Infrastructure and a Research Training Site in several scientific fields. UiB has so far completed more than 150 EU research projects, about 20% of them as coordinator. UiB is currently involved in 69 H2020 collaborative research projects, 18 of which it coordinates. UiB researchers and administrators receive professional support from a dedicated research support team consisting of advisers from different divisions like finance, research administration or communication during applications and for project management.

The Geophysical Institute (GFI) has attracted most EU funding of all institutes at UiB and is currently partner in 14 collaborative EU projects, one as coordinator. The Geophysical Institute at the UiB is the largest of such institute in Norway in physical and chemical oceanography, and by hosting the collaborative Bjerknes Centre for Climate Research, it is equally a leading contributor to international climate research. GFI has in its strategic plan to continue to lead in both observational and modelling oriented studies of oceans and climate.

 Expertise particularly relevant to the project

Professional routines and structures within research support and administration and many years of experience with successful coordination and management (administrative, financial and data) of large collaborative EU projects make UiB a suitable candidate to coordinate this project. The GFI hosts the Bjerknes Climate Data Centre, an international data service centre for managing and archiving research data according to the FAIR principle, making UiB a suitable candidate for the project’s data management. The Biogeochemistry Group at UiB/GFI is specialised on ocean carbon observations and Earth system modelling. It has coordinated the GHG related projects CARBOOCEAN (IP, FP6) and CARBOCHANGE (large-scale integrating project, FP7). The group provides key contributions to international ocean data syntheses (SOCAT, GLODAP), to annual updates of the Global Carbon Budget, and to CMIP6 (coupled model intercomparison project phase 6).

For more information visit UiB website.

Description of the organisation

The host institution will be Climate and Environmental Physics, Physics Institute at the University of Bern (UBERN). With 17,500 students and 2,700 PhD students, UBERN is the third largest university in Switzerland and is ranked 105 in The World University Rankings 2018. The university’s comprehensive offering includes 8 faculties with more than 150 institutes. UBERN hosts several internationally recognised research centres, such as the Oeschger Centre for Climate Change Research, which bundles the research activities on climate change across four faculties. UBERN is very experienced in managing EU Grants and has been involved in projects since FP3. For FP7 and Horizon 2020, this amounts to about 130 and 60 grants, respectively. UBERN has endorsed the “The European Charter for Researchers” and “The Code of Conduct for the Recruitment of Researchers”. European grants are managed by the Euresearch office, which is part of the Grants Office. For FP7, UBERN has 109 completed projects. UBERN currently hosts about 80 EU-funded projects from FP7 and Horizon 2020.

Expertise particularly relevant for the project

Climate and Environmental Physics (CEP), UBERN, has more than 40 years of experience in modelling biogeochemical cycles, climate, and the Earth system. CEP has pioneered reduced form models and Earth system models of intermediate complexity and has extensive experience in applying state-of-the-art Earth system models. The overall focus of the Climate and Environmental Physics department (CEP) is to understand the environment, its present and past and its evolution on time scales from decades to one million years. The department currently has a scientific and technical staff of around 60 people. During the three years from 2015 to 2017, 132 papers have been published and 10 PhD theses completed. 9 papers were published in Science and or Nature journals. Members of CEP have been involved in all major IPCC Assessments since the First Assessment Report and contributed to IPCC as Co-Chair of Working Group I, as Vice Chair of WGI, and as coordinating lead authors, lead authors and review editors in various Reports and Technical Papers.

For more information visit UBERN website.