Louisiana State University and Tulane University have been awarded $22 million by the National Academy of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine to fund a consortium known as The Mississippi River Delta Transition Initiative or MissDelta. The group will be researching one of the most vulnerable coastal areas in the world, the Lower Mississippi River Delta.
The team will focus on the crucially important part of the delta where the Mississippi River and Gulf of Mexico meet, known as the Birdfoot. MissDelta will work for the next five years to calculate the future of the eroding delta through the year 2100 if nothing is done to counteract the increasing threats it faces, including hurricanes, rising seas, ground subsidence, diminishing river sediment, coastal dead zones, navigation channel changes and rising maintenance costs.
Over the duration of the project a large portion of the funds will be dedicated to testing strategies to sustain the delta and its changing ecosystem. MissDelta will also work with other agencies to recognize urgent problems and devise plans to support the delta under different climate scenarios. They will pass on all their findings and recommendations to the powers that be.

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Another large goal of the funding will be expanding the workforce and diversity in coastal research. To help increase members from underrepresented groups, the consortium will work with students from middle and high schools to be a part of the coastal research. To encourage student involvement MissDelta will organize field trips and provide opportunities to work in labs.
On top of LSU and Tulane, the team will include Southern University of Baton Rouge, Xavier University of New Orleans, Jackson State University, Grambling State University, Dillard University, Alcorn State University, University of Southern Mississippi, the University of Central Florida, the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, the Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium, the Water Institute of the Gulf, and the College of William & Mary in Virginia.
Six of the schools involved are historically Black colleges and universities. This is important to the program because of their mission to expand diversity in the Gulf Coast research workforce and increase science identities. With such a broad group of schools the program carries a large amount of diversity in its team which helps to broaden the scope of research.
The program creates opportunity for students in the LSU College of Science and other related majors to get hands on experience in their field, providing experience and enabling students to better the delta’s ecosystem, a vital process for the coast’s future.

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The fading of the delta is thought to be a result from loss of sediment which could have unknown effects on food and water quality. If nothing is done to stop the disappearing of the Birdfoot, families, companies, wildlife, energy and the economy could be affected drastically. The MissDelta’s work seeks to help decision-makers understand the scope of the issues they will eventually need to solve.