[Coral-List] Remote sensing, conservation, and sustainable resource apps?

[James Goodman]

Frank,

 

Good question. The answer is clearly yes, but you pose an interesting
challenge with respect to identifying exactly what resource conservation and
sustainability questions can be explicitly addressed using remote sensing
techniques (no what ifs, no subjective analysis, no value judgments). The
strengths of remote sensing speak to its synoptic coverage of large areas,
from local to global, its growing temporal archive, and its capacity for
repeatable quantitative analysis techniques. On its own it can also provide
valuable spatial maps for resource management and assessment, but without
additional information, it is difficult in most cases to assess specific
cause and effect relationships related to resource decline. Additionally, in
many instances there is insufficient imagery available to address certain
questions, suggesting that, no matter what the question, there is a common
need to expand global image acquisition of critical habitats for current and
future studies.

 

So what questions can be answered using remote sensing? Below are a few for
consideration (questions are related specifically to the marine environment,
but could be extended to terrestrial ecosystems as well):

- What is the current global distribution of coral reefs and, for areas
where a temporal record of imagery exists, how has this distribution
changed?

- What are the areas where coral reefs have exhibited the least decline and
the most decline?

- How do spatial and temporal trends in coral coverage correlate with other
measurable remote sensing parameters, e.g., sea surface temperature,
turbidity, coastal development, deforestation, etc.?

- Of the measurable remote sensing parameters, which ones are most
significantly correlated with changes in coral coverage?

- What types of marine protected areas or resource management plans have the
highest ratio of coral cover inside the management area compared to outside?

- Is there a correlation between marine protected area spatial
configuration, e.g., size, extent, distribution, etc., and the ratio of
coral cover inside the protected area compared to outside?

- What spatial scale(s) offers the best basis for estimating habitat
diversity and biodiversity?

 

Sincerely,

-Jamie

 

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James Goodman, PhD, PE

james.a.goodman at gmail.com

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President/CEO, HySpeed Computing LLC

PO Box 431824, Miami, FL 33243

jgoodman at hyspeedcomputing.com

www.linkedin.com/in/goodmanjames

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Message: 1

Date: Wed, 29 Aug 2012 08:43:08 -0400

From: Frank Muller-Karger <carib at marine.usf.edu>

Subject: [Coral-List] Remote sensing, conservation,         and sustainable

                resource apps?

To: coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov

Message-ID: <503E0E5C.6020804 at marine.usf.edu>

Content-Type: text/plain; charset="ISO-8859-1"

 

 

   Dear colleagues:

   Can we use our science and remote sensing technologies in conservation
and

   sustainable use of resources? NASA is interested in addressing issues in

   biodiversity, sustainability and conservation biology using remote
sensing

   technologies. A group of researchers has been asked to work with their

   different science communities to help define the top 10 questions for
which

   solutions would require remote sensing methods.

   If  you  could,  please  send  ideas on questions directly relevant to

   conservation  (and  specifically  not  on  questions  of technological

   advancements) before September 15. If it is easier to provide input by

   phone, let me know and let's coordinate a phone call.

   Our specific guidance is that questions should be:

   ??         dependent on remote sensing technologies to answer

   ??         answerable through a realistic research design

   ??         allow a factual answer that does not depend on value judgments

   ??         address important gaps in conservation knowledge

   ??         not formulated as a general topic area

   ??         not answerable with ???it all depends???

   ??         unlikely to be answerable with yes or no

   Some guidance on what this group would be looking for can be found in:

   Sutherland, W. J., Adams, W. M., Aronson, R. B., Aveling, R., Blackburn,
T.

   M.,  Broad,  S., Ceballos, G., et al. (2009). One Hundred Questions of

   Importance  to  the  Conservation  of  Global    Biological Diversity.

   Conservation Biology, 23(3), 557-567

   Thank you very much for your feedback.

   Best regards,

   Frank

   [1]carib at marine.usf.edu