Prof. Jan Backhaus
Dr. Ingo Harms  harms(at)ifm.uni-hamburg.de
Kai Logemann
Dr. Henning Wehde

STEREO is an EU-funded project which is joined by 6 partners from 5 countries: UK, Iceland, Norway, Denmark and Germany.

The overall objective of STEREO is to improve the methodology for determining limit reference points for the biomass of exploited fish stocks. Limit reference points set boundaries which are intended to constrain harvesting within safe biological limits, and are integral components of the decision making process in fisheries management. STEREO will produce an operational scheme for refining spawning biomass and recruitment data by integrating biological, spatial and temporal information on the stock, with the aim of reducing the uncertainty associated with biological limits. The methodology will be developed for cod and haddock stocks around Iceland, Norway and in the North Sea as case studies.

The main goal of STEREO is to produce a model of stock composition and distributional effects on the reproductive output of cod and haddock. One sub-module of this stock composition model is a particle tracking model for egg and larval dispersal which needs input data on circulation and hydrography. The Institute of Oceanography, University Hamburg, is the responsible task leader for the hydrodynamic modelling around Iceland, Norway and in the North Sea. In order to provide the particle tracking model with input data, our institute applies a three-dimensional circulation model (HAMSOM) to the northeast Atlantic and a one-dimensional mixed-layer model to the areas around Iceland, Norway and Scotland.

Logemann K., J.O. Backhaus and I.H. Harms (2004):
SNAC: A statistical model of the North Atlantic circulation
Ocean Modelling, Volume 7, Issues 1-2, pp 97-110