page_title: Mesocosm
section_title: Examples
hierarchical_section_title: Mesocosm / Examples
caption_attribution_description: Hoplias malabaricus
context_page_description: A mesocosm is any outdoor experimental system that examines the natural environment under controlled conditions. In this way mesocosm studies provide a link between field surveys and highly controlled laboratory experiments.
  Mesocosms also tend to be medium-sized to large and contain multiple trophic levels of interacting organisms.
  In contrast to laboratory experiments, mesocosm studies are normally conducted outdoors in order to incorporate natural variation. Mesocosm studies may be conducted in either an enclosure that is small enough that key variables can be brought under control or by field-collecting key components of the natural environment for further experimentation.
  Extensive mesocosm studies have been conducted to evaluate how organisms or communities might react to environmental change, through deliberate manipulation of environmental variables, such as increased temperature, carbon dioxide or pH levels.
context_section_description: [A]  Mazzeo and colleagues examined the eating habits of Hoplias malabaricus fish when exposed to different amounts of phytoplankton, zooplankton, and competition. Three months prior to conducting the experiment, they maintained an average precipitation, air temperature, and overall subtropical environment. Using 12 units, they filled them with aquifer water, sand and plants and kept them in isolation until the environment became suitable for phytoplankton to emerge. After careful preparation, Mazzeo et al. began the experiment dividing those units into categories of a control (zooplankton and phytoplankton) and 3 experiments: (Jenynsia multidentata with zooplankton and phytoplankton), (juvenile Hoplias malabaricus with zooplankton and phytoplankton), and (Large Hoplias malabaricus, Jenynsia multidentata, zooplankton, and phytoplankton) and observed biomass differences within different conditions.
  [B]  Flanagan and McCauley tested the effects of climate warming on carbon dioxide concentration on shallow ponds by creating an eight-cylinder shaped in situ mesocosms.  They divided it into four controls and four experiments on University of Calgary's campus pond. Those mesocosms contained openings underneath and were submerged at the same depth as the pond. By carefully sustaining the sediments and temperature from any changes, the production of zooplankton and algae were successful. After manipulation (pumping heat into water), they measured the sediments at the bottom of the pond for carbon dioxide concentration. After collecting data and analyzing it, Flanagan and McCauley concluded that due to the warming of the environment in the pond, carbon dioxide from the pond will increase into the surroundings, in turn, decreasing the amount of carbon dioxide within the sediments, indirectly modifying the carbon cycle of that ecosystem.
  [C]  Mesocosms are useful for studying the fate of pollutants in marine environments as well as providing the ability to conduct controlled manipulative experiments that could not be undertaken in natural marine environments.  Since 1976, the Marine Ecosystems Research Laboratory (MERL) at the University of Rhode Island has been conducting pollution studies and experimental marine ecological studies using mesocosm tanks drawing water from nearby Narragansett Bay.
  Example publications of scientific studies using the MERL mesocosms include:
  Hinga, K.R., M.E.Q. Pilson, R.F. Lee, J.W. Farrington, K. Tjessem and A.C. Davis. 1980. Biogeochemistry of benzanthracene in an enclosed marine ecosystem.  Environmental Science and Technology 14:1136-1143.
  Hunt, C.D. and S.L. Smith. 1982. Controlled marine ecosystems- A tool for studying stable trace metal cycles: Long-term response and variability.  pp. 123–135  In: G.D. Grice and M.R. Reeves, (eds.) Marine Mesocosms: Biological and Chemical Research in Experimental Ecosystems. Springer Verlag, New York.
  Donaghay, P.L. 1984. Utility of mesocosms to assess marine pollution.  pp. 589–620 In: H.H. White, (ed). Concepts in Marine Pollution Measurements. Maryland Sea Grant College, College Park, Maryland.
  Doering, P.H., C.A. Oviatt, and J.R. Reilly 1986. The effects of the filter feeding clam Mercenaria mercenaria on carbon cycling in experimental marine mesocosms. Journal of Marine Research 44:839-861.
  Oviatt, C.A., D.T. Rudnick, A.A. Keller, P.A. Sampou, and G.T. Almquist. 1986. A comparison of system oxygen and carbon dioxide and C-14 measurements of metabolism in estuarine mesocosms.  Marine Ecology Progress Series 28:57-67.
  Nowicki, B.L. and C.A. Oviatt. 1990. Are estuaries traps for anthropogenic nutrients?  Evidence from estuarine mesocosms. Marine Ecology Progress Series 66:131-146.
  Doering, P.H., C.A. Oviatt, B.L. Nowicki, E.G. Klos and L.W. Reed. 1995. Phosphorus and nitrogen limitation of primary production in a simulated estuarine gradient. Limnology and Oceanography. 124:271-287.
  Peitros, J.M. and M.A. Rice. 2003. The impacts of aquacultured oysters, Crassostrea virginica (Gmelin, 1791) on water quality and sedimentation: results of a mesocosm study.  Aq
caption: A Hoplias malabaricus fish.
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