ON COASTAL ENVINRONMENTS SD MODELS

[maesteve@fcu.um.es (Julia M. Fer]

Dear members of the SD-community,

I am trying to build-up a first SD exploratory model to describe
some recent changes in a coastal lagoon in Spain. These changes include a
bloom of two jellyfish species wich have created a serious problem to the
touristic sector. This problem have induce policy makers to finance an
inter-disciplinary research to study the origin of the situation and to
propose measures.


We think that some specific recent changes to promote tourism in
this Mar Menor coastal lagoon (one of most valuable and singular in the
Mediterranean) are responsible for this bloom, and that this is a good
example of feedback loops with important consequences at the short or
intermediate place for public opinion and policy makers.

I would like to know about SD models in relation to coastal
environments (lagoons or marine ecosystems) linking the biological cycle of
jellyfish species with other factors like water pollution, nutrients, water
temperature changes or other perturbations induced by agricultural or
touristic managements. They would be a great help for us.

I would grate any kind of information, comment or suggestion about
these thopics. Thank you very much to all of you.

Julia Martinez Fernandez
Departamento de Ecologie Hidrologa
Universidad de Murcia (ESPANA)
e-mail: maesteve@fcu.um.es
address: Campus de Espinardo, 30100-MURCIA (ESPANA)