Salt marsh development under the influence of decadal and climate variations
With the proposed project, I intend to investigate the relative influence of storm activity and changes of river discharge as a consequence of climate change and decadal climate variations (e.g. El Niño) on the long-term evolution of estuarine/deltaic salt marshes. Based on the hypothesis, formulated by Kolker et al. (2009) and Schuerch et al. (2012b), I will further assess whether the influence of increased storm activity and variations of river discharges is more pronounced on salt marshes in micro-tidal environments than on salt marshes in macro-tidal environments.