A Proposal to Identify Future Directions in Coastal Science Research

College Of William & Mary Virginia Institute Of Marine Science, Gloucester Point VA

Investigators

Abstract

This award is for initial planning of a possible workshop that will bring together the coastal science community and identify research priorities for the next decade. The workshop and associated online discussion will be dedicated to collecting and synthesizing transformative ideas from coastal research communities on the future of coastal research and to identify gaps that need to be filled to achieve an understanding of coastal systems at a level appropriate for contemporary challenges to the sustainability of human interactions with coastal environments. The planners will discuss how to target research communities addressing questions in various coastal and allied environments (e.g., nearshore, beach and surf zone hydro and morphodynamics; sandy coastlines and barrier islands; rocky coastlines; deltas; estuaries; marshes, mangroves and other tidal settings; carbonate coasts; polar settings. Disciplinary and interdisciplinary approaches to be represented in the workshop will include ecomorphodynamics (bio/physical couplings); anthropogenic components (human/landscape couplings; both couplings with direct human manipulations and land-use effects on coastal environments); terrestrial/coastal interactions (fluvial couplings with coastline as well as delta dynamics); shelf/coastal interactions (shallow-water and shelf processes, climate and sea-level-rise effects); biogeochemistry and atmospheric interactions.