Western Arctic Shelf-Basin Interactions (SBI) Project

_ direction (post-meeting evaluation by e-mail)
_ Science plan pg. 28
_ Priority measurements and appropriate time and space scales to be developed during Phase I by SSC with input from Phase I PIs
_ discussed workshop Phase I / perspectives for 10/24 SBI PI meeting
_ SSC to meet after March 2000 PI meeting to work on implementation plan: discuss ship time, station location, etc.

1. Status Phase II ramp up/mooring program 2001
_ how to handle?
_ need biogeochemical sensors on moorings

1. International Pan-Arctic SBI meeting 2000
_ Purpose à open vs closed
_ Where/when/invitees

1. Funding potential/timeline

2. Modeling Issues (see attached appendix report)


Appendix: Modeling Report of Discussions of SBI Phase I Modeling PIs (P. Wheeler)

During the Oct. 1999 OAII meeting principal investigators with some modeling components from six of the eight SBI Phase I funded proposals met informally on Thursday and Friday evenings (Oct. 21 and 22) during dinner and also as a smaller group on Thursday afternoon (Oct. 21). Principal investigators present at one or more of these discussions were: Chapman, Cota, Dunton, Gawarkiewicz, Maslowski, Plueddemann, Smith, Spitz and Wheeler. Falkner was unable to attend the meeting and Stamnes was only present on the last day. The two main modeling components in this group were Maslowski (for the general and regional circulation) and Wheeler and Spitz (for the ecosystem model). Other physical modelling components include Plueddeann (eddies) and Chapman and Gawarkiewicz (polynyas). More information and discussion among the physical and biological investigators will be essential to help define the most important components of a field program. The other biological components are directed more towards assembling data sets that will be useful for testing the ecosystem model and for planning field studies.

Two issues were rasied at the August 1999 Steering Committee meeting:
1) whether there was a consistent and adequate regional circulation model; and 2) whether or not there is sufficient coupling of the biological and physical models. Both of these questions primarily concern the Maslowski proposal and the Wheeler and Spitz proposals. Discussions were initiated among these PIs and will continue as Phase I progresses. For the other components, integration and coordination is certainly desirable, but there was insufficient time available at the meeting to really initiate this effort. It should be one of the major goals at the principal investigator meeting in spring of 2000.

The most interesting discussions we had were the small group discussions of what some of the major physical processes were and how these might affect the chemical distributions and biological activity. These discussions stimulated Tom Weingartner to draft a brief statement of how these could be used to focus the goals of the SBI initiative. Tom presented a version of this to the OAII Steering Committee (which stimulated the development of the current SBI goals statement by the SBI SSC, currently posted on the SBI web page). Many, if not all, of the participants expressed some concern about a clear scientific focus for the inplementation plan. This is the most critical issue to address over the next few months.