The Gulf of Mexico
​The video discusses the changes seen in the Gulf of Mexico related to the growth of the dead zone.
Biodiversity and Ecosystem Variety
Since the Gulf of Mexico contains a variety of marine-based and wetland habitats there are a significant number of different species that are able to live there. “In this volume, the Gulf of Mexico is defined as the wetlands, coastal waters, and marine habitats” each of which allows a different variety of species to thrive due to varying conditions (Munguia, 2011: 133). More so, diversity is apparent when focusing on the relationships formed between plants and microbes because the diversity begins with the microbes and fungi that regulate environmental processes (Lumibao, Formel, Elango, Blum, & Van Beal, 2018: 905). The breadth of diversity among lower trophic species is important since they serve regulatory functions that sustain the environment like absorbing CO^2 and decomposing organic matter. The functions allow for diversity in higher trophic levels to maintain balance due to cyclical functions but also regulating microbes.
Education and Sustainability
The gulf coast provides and education to students regarding way to interact with the environment. According to the EPA (2018), the Gulf of Mexico is and educational tool that can be utilized by schools, specifically along the coast to expand environmental awareness, the hands-on program set in place by the EPA serves the function of getting gulf coast residents to understand the relationship that exists between human action and the environment. The hope is that residents will enact more sustainable behaviors so that environments in and along the gulf will continue to be prosperous in years to come. By creating programs that expose people some of the issues facing their environment, the government hopes to over time create more sustainable communities (EPA, 2018). Along the coast of the Gulf of Mexico, sustainable communities deal with both land and marine habitats and are responsible for small scale changes that occur due to human action such as building and habitat manipulation; an example would be using coastlines as tourist locations.