- acclimatisation
-
the adjustment of an organism to environmental conditions in the field or environment rather than the laboratory without an adjustment in their genetics. Acclimatisation has been used to describe phenotypically plastic responses in natural conditions. Source: Ross et al. (2023).
- adaptation
-
the evolutionary mechanism where natural selection of traits is genetically passed on, typically over many generations, to create an organism suited to the environment. Source: [rossRoss et al. (2023)
- adaptive capacity
-
the capacity of the ecosystem or organism to improve and reorganise in response to stress such as climate change through phenotypic plasticity (acclimation, acclimatisation) or adaptation, distributional shifts, and rapid evolution of traits suited to new conditions. Source: Ross et al. (2023).
- BOEM
-
Bureau of Ocean Energy Management — US federal agency responsible for managing offshore energy and mineral resources on the Outer Continental Shelf.
- COG
-
Cloud-Optimized GeoTIFF — a raster file format optimized for efficient access over HTTP, enabling range requests for partial reads.
- DuckDB
-
an embedded analytical database engine used for storing and querying species distribution models, extinction risk scores, and sensitivity metrics.
- ecoregion
-
a BOEM-defined ecological region used as the spatial unit for rescaling sensitivity scores to enable meaningful cross-region comparison.
- epigenetics
-
the modification of phenotype plasticity of an organism through altered gene expression without an alteration to the DNA sequence. ‘Epi’ means above the DNA and includes DNA methylation, modification of histones, and non-coding RNA. Source: Ross et al. (2023).
- ESA
-
Endangered Species Act (1973) — US federal law providing protections for species listed as Endangered or Threatened by NMFS or FWS.
- exposure
-
the magnitude of the change in the environment
- fecundity
-
the maximum physiological potential reproductive output of an organism to produce offspring (reproductive output). This differs from fertility, which is the number of offspring born. Source: Ross et al. (2023)
- MBON
-
Marine Biodiversity Observation Network; see MarineBON.org
- MBTA
-
Migratory Bird Treaty Act (1918) — US federal law protecting migratory birds, including most seabird species. MBTA-protected species receive a minimum spatial floor score of 10.
- MMPA
-
Marine Mammal Protection Act (1972) — US federal law protecting all marine mammals in US waters. MMPA-protected species receive a minimum spatial floor score of 20.
- MST
-
Marine Sensitivity Toolkit — the cloud-native system developed for BOEM to assess marine ecosystem sensitivity to offshore energy development.
- OCSLA
-
Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act — US federal law governing the management of offshore resources, including the mandate to consider environmental sensitivity and marine productivity.
- resilience
-
the capacity of an ecosystem, society, or organism to absorb disturbance and reorganise while undergoing change so as to retain essentially the same function, structure, identity, and feedbacks. Resilience reflects the degree to which a complex adaptive system is determined by its capacity to reorganise and adapt in order to avoid being disturbed again. Source: Ross et al. (2023).
- SDM
-
Species Distribution Model — a statistical or environmental envelope model predicting the spatial distribution of a species based on environmental variables.
- sensitivity
-
the magnitude of response to the change
- stressor
-
the stimulus that causes stress to an organism
- vulnerability
-
combination of exposure and sensitivity
Ross, Pauline M., Elliot Scanes, Maria Byrne, Tracy D. Ainsworth, Jennifer M. Donelson, Shawna A. Foo, Pat Hutchings, Vengatesen Thiyagarajan, and Laura M. Parker. 2023. “Surviving the Anthropocene: The Resilience of Marine Animals to Climate Change.” In. CRC Press.