The scientific goal of the workshop was to identify and explore the relationships between large rivers and marine populations and how these relationships might be affected by climate changes. As a result, riverine discharges of freshwater and nutrients are responsive to changes in rainfall in the drainage basins, and riverine discharge of nutrients is responsive to anthropogenic activities in the drainage basin.
Buoyant plumes are quickly responsive to wind.
In the U.S., the Mississippi River is the major large river , with discharge equal to approximately 2.2 times that of the Columbia River and 2.9 times that of the Yukon River. The Mississippi River supports much of the biological production in the northern Gulf of Mexico. High rates of primary production stimulate and support high rates of zooplankton production. There is a characteristic group of copepod species in the vicinity of the Mississippi River plume which is numerically dominated by Temora turbinata , Eucalanus pileatus , Centropages furcatus , Paracalanus spp. There are demonstrated relationships between these inputs and population responses in zooplankton and fish, and there are suggestions of an ecosystem shift towards a system more dominated by pelagic fish species.