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[1] Enterococci are the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency recommended fecal indicator bacteria for assessing recreational marine water quality. Traditional methods of enterococci analyses are time consuming, resulting in delays in issuing beach closures. Models can potentially circumvent these delays by forecasting times when beaches should be closed. The objective of this study is to develop an innovative coupled microbehydrodynamic-morphological model. The unique feature of this model is its capability of simulating the release of microbes attached to coastal beach sands as a result of combined wave and tidal forcing. A nearshore process model (XBeach) was coupled with a microbe transport-decay equation. This equation included source functions that accounted for microbial release from mobilized sand, groundwater flow, entrainment through pore water diffusion, rainfall-runoff loading, and a fate function that accounted for solar inactivation effects. The model successfully simulated observed spatial and temporal patterns of enterococci in the beach water, including the reproduction of diel and tidal fluctuations and the rapid decrease of enterococci levels from the waterline to offshore. Primary processes for enterococci loading to the water column included wave-induced sediment resuspension and tidal washing for the entrainment of enterococci from the pore water in the intertidal zone. Diffusion was the major mechanism to transport enterococci from the intertidal zone to offshore. Sunlight inactivation was a key process to reduce enterococci levels during the day and to produce the diurnal cycles. Rainfall runoff was found to be an intermittent source of enterococci to beach water, whereas groundwater exchange was of secondary importance. Sensitivity analyses suggested that the processes and coefficients related to enterococci loading have quasi-linear characteristics, whereas model results of enterococci levels were sensitive to both diffusion and sunlight inactivation coefficients, showing high nonlinearity and spatial and temporal dependence.

Fecal indicator microbes such as enterococci are often used to assess potential health risks caused by pathogens at recreational beaches. Microbe levels often vary based on collection time and sampling location. The primary goal of this study was to assess how spatial and temporal variations in sample collection which are driven by environmental parameters impact enterococci measurements and beach management decisions. A secondary goal was to assess whether enterococci levels can be predictive of the presence of Staphylococcus aureus a skin pathogen. Over a ten day period hydrometeorologic data hydrodynamic data bather densities enterococci levels and S. aureus levels including methicillin-resistant S. aureus (MRSA) were measured in both water and sand. Samples were collected hourly for both water and sediment at knee-depth and every 6 hours for water at waist-depth supratidal sand intertidal sand and waterline sand. Results showed that solar radiation tides and rainfall events were major environmental factors that impacted enterococci levels. S. aureus levels were associated with bathing load but did not correlate with enterococci levels or any other measured parameters. The results imply that frequencies of advisories depend heavily upon sample collection policies due to spatial and temporal variation of enterococci levels in response to environmental parameters. Thus sampling at different times of the day and at different depths can significantly impact beach management decisions. Additionally the lack of correlation between S. aureus and enterococci suggests that use of fecal indicators may not accurately assess risk for some pathogens.

Dramatic changes have occurred in the Arctic Ocean over the past few decades, especially in terms of sea ice loss and ocean warming. Those environmental changes may modify the planktonic ecosystem with changes from lower to upper trophic levels. This study aimed to understand how the biogeographic distribution of a crucial endemic copepod species, Calanus glacialis, may respond to both abiotic (ocean temperature) and biotic (phytoplankton prey) drivers. A copepod individual-based model coupled to an ice-ocean-biogeochemical model was utilized to simulate temperature-and food-dependent life cycle development of C. glacialis annually from 1980 to 2014. Over the 35-year study period, the northern boundaries of modeled diapausing C. glacialis expanded poleward and the annual success rates of C. glacialis individuals attaining diapause in a circumpolar transition zone increased substantially. Those patterns could be explained by a lengthening growth season (during which time food is ample) and shortening critical development time (the period from the first feeding stage N3 to the diapausing stage C4). The biogeographic changes were further linked to large-scale oceanic processes, particularly diminishing sea ice cover, upper ocean warming, and increasing and prolonging food availability, which could have potential consequences to the entire Arctic shelf/slope marine ecosystems. K E Y W O R D SArctic Ocean, biogeography, climate change, copepod, individual-based model, marine ecosystem, ocean warming, poleward range shift