Global change

Human activities are increasingly altering the composition and integrity of our coastal and marine ecosystems. Land-use changes, increasing coastal urbanization and industrialization, population growth, altered water availability and quality, and climate change are already having a major impact on marine habitats, ecological processes and communities, and the livability of our coastal cities. This chapter focuses on anthropogenic global change which is defined as “the global-scale changes resulting from the impact of human activity on the major processes that regulate the functioning of the biosphere.” Current research emphasis is on multiple stressors and how they may interact to potentially impact marine and estuarine ecosystems over the next 50–100 years. Our understanding of marine ecotoxicology from a multiple stressor perspective has benefited from the development and application of a range of new tools for assessing ecosystem health. Epigenetics, omics, and modeling approaches are just some of the new tools that can assist in assessing responses to global change.