Climate change can affect the habitat of marine species and hence their persistence and adaptation. Trends in area of occurrence and population biomass were examined for 177 fish and macroinvertebrates resident to the Northeast U.S. Continental Shelf ecosystem. Samples of these organisms were taken during a time series of research bottom trawl surveys conducted in the spring and autumn 1976–2019. The occurrence area of each taxon was modeled as the distribution of occurrence probability based on a random forest presence/absence classification model. Following, a population biomass of each taxon was modeled as a minimum swept area estimate, where the ecosystem was stratified biannually based on each taxon's spatial distribution. In both seasons, the sum of occurrence area and biomass across all modeled species increased over the study period. The summation of biomass is problematic since catchability is not known for most species; more importantly, most time series of individual species biomass trended higher. We found that the ratio of biomass to occurrence area, intended as a measure of productivity, showed no change in the autumn and had a weak increasing trend in spring. For the majority of taxa, the rate of change in biomass tracked changes in occurrence area (either positive or negative), but there were cases where the direction of change in biomass was opposite to the direction of change in occurrence area. Thermal conditions in surface waters appear to be a more important driver of occurrence area and biomass change than the change in thermal conditions near the bottom. These findings provide critical insights into the expected changes in ecosystem productivity transpiring with climate change.

中文翻译：

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美国东北部大陆架生态系统鱼类和大型无脊椎动物的分布面积和生物量趋势

气候变化会影响海洋物种的栖息地，从而影响它们的生存和适应。研究了居住在美国东北部大陆架生态系统中的 177 种鱼类和大型无脊椎动物的发生面积和种群生物量趋势。这些生物的样本是在 1976 年至 2019 年春季和秋季进行的一系列研究底拖网调查期间采集的。每个分类单元的发生区域被建模为基于随机森林存在/不存在分类模型的发生概率分布。接下来，每个分类单元的种群生物量被建模为最小扫掠面积估计值，其中生态系统根据每个分类单元的空间分布每半年进行一次分层。在这两个季节中，所有模拟物种的发生面积和生物量总和在研究期间都有所增加。生物量的总和是有问题的，因为大多数物种的可捕获性是未知的；更重要的是，大多数时间序列的单个物种生物量呈上升趋势。我们发现生物量与发生面积的比率，旨在作为生产力的衡量标准，在秋季没有变化，在春季有微弱的增加趋势。对于大多数类群，生物量变化率跟随发生区域的变化（正或负），但也有生物量变化方向与发生区域变化方向相反的情况。与底部附近的热条件变化相比，地表水的热条件似乎是发生区域和生物量变化的更重要驱动因素。