The Changing World

Human population, global warming, CO2 increases, nutrient pollution, and human alterations of freshwater flow are all contributing to complex changes in aquatic systems. Eutrophication and climate change and other anthropogenic activities and their effects underscore the urgency for the study of phytoplankton. Recognizing the vast anthropogenic effects that rising CO2, temperatures, nutrient pollution, greenhouse gas pollution, harvesting and the production of food (and its associated fertilizer use and animal confinement), and altered hydrodynamics for water consumption or electricity generation are having on the globe is fundamental to understanding how these changes affect ecological function and biodiversity or our aquatic systems. This chapter describes the trajectories of these global changes.