NPRB supports large-scale interdisciplinary ecosystem-based research. This requires multiple agency coordination, collaboration, and investigation of a broad suite of research centered on a specific large marine ecosystem. NPRB developed the Integrated Ecosystem Research Program (IERP) to support large-scale research to better understand the complex mechanistic processes that influence the structure and function of marine ecosystems. IERP investigations include, for example, studies of the processes that affect productivity, organize biological communities, shape species interactions, and influence ecosystem services for communities and industry. IERP research is explicitly intended to identify and characterize important ecosystem attributes and processes to improve our ability to forecast and respond to environmental change.

The program promotes collaboration across disciplines (e.g., oceanography, fisheries, social science) and integration across ecosystem components (e.g., physics, chemistry, plankton, invertebrates, fishes, marine birds and mammals, humans). It also advances partnership and exchange among the wide range of entities and institutions responsible for implementing research and management in the North Pacific. For each Integrated Ecosystem Research Program (IERP) there is a primary research focus, with connections to each NRPB topic area (see below). Since 2002, NPRB has supported three IERPs in the Bering Sea, Gulf of Alaska, and Arctic marine ecosystems. NPRB is currently planning a fourth IERP that will be centered in, but not limited to, the Northern Bering Sea. The intent is to examine processes and dynamics in this region as influenced by adjacent systems.