AMEMR 2014

AMEMR 2014 saw a return to the Lewinsky building facilities during the first week of July. We were pleased to welcome 140 delegates from over 15 countries, maintaining the international perspective of the conference. As is now normal we received 160 abstract submissions which proved challenging to fit into a busy 4 day event. The conference saw 65 oral presentations and 90 poster presentations distributed amongst the conference themes of:
•    Ecosystems and their interactions
•    Projections, predictions and confidence
•    Novel approaches
•    Exploiting models in the context of ecosystem services, policy and management

The conference had a strong focus on promoting interdisciplinary discussion among scientists and students with different backgrounds and expertise (including modelling, experimental and observational scientists) who desire to contribute to the direction of new marine ecosystem models.

Sessions kicked off with interesting and thought provoking keynote presentations. Tim Lenton spoke on ‘Multiple environmental controls on phytoplankton strategies’, while Wendy Gentlemen focused on what models imply about stoichiometry of phytoplankton uptake and growth. In the context of exploiting models for policy and management Yunne-Jai Shin discussed multi-model evaluation of ecosystem indicator.  Building confidence in marine ecosystem projections under a changing climate is a key topic for the community and Charles Stock presented his views and latest work on this topic.