Major Research Analytical study of macro-organisms dynamics on a coastal ecosystem simulation

Inner bays in Japan such as Tokyo Bay and Ise Bay experienced industrial development and population growth during the post-war period of high economic growth, which caused large amounts of nutrients to be transported from rivers into those inner bays, causing eutrophication. Although the regulation on aggregate amount that was subsequent enforced improved the situation to some degree, the decreasing amount of fish caught in the inner bays remains a problem, the root cause of which is yet to be identified.
 

The objective of this study is to simulate fish dynamics by integrating a fish ecosystem model into the Ise Bay simulator comprised of a current model and a lower-trophic-level ecosystem model.
 

We developed a fish ecosystem model that could be run on the Ise Bay simulator, and performed calculations to simulate fish dynamics present in Ise Bay. Application of this model not only allowed us to produce short-term results but also prove that it could perform calculations for whole years.
 

This model is also applicable to other inner bays besides Ise Bay, and is expected to play an important role in fishery resource management in various sea areas. For example, if a coastal sea area is to be developed and there is a fish species that uses the sea area only during a specific season, we could create a work schedule to avoid disturbing the fish during that season, and manage the overall work process in consideration of the creatures and the environment that could be affected by the work.

We will attempt to improve the calculation precision using a parameter tuning system. It is also important to accumulate data on the existing fish species utilizing fish-finder data, environmental DNA, and other related technology.