HAB Investigation

The following activity will allow you to explore, examine, and analyze several different real-time satellite data sets to determine any relationships that may exist between the presence of Karenia brevis blooms and chlorophyll_a data and sea surface temperature data. You will examine satellite data from the NOAA/ NESDIS website as well as data from the University of Miami Rosenstiel School MODIS website.

Begin be going to the NOAA/ NESDIS Gallery of Karenia brevis Blooms site. Scroll through the gallery until you find several days throughout the year where there was a significant presence of k. brevis present. You may click on individual images to enlarge them for a closer look. Print the images on a color printer if you have access to one.

http://orbit-net.nesdis.noaa.gov/orad2/doc/gbrv_www_2002.html

Once you have several days in 2002 selected, click on the UM/RSMAS MODIS site:

http://www.rsmas.miami.edu/groups/rrsl/modis/

Select the same day of the year that you selected for the Karenia brevis blooms and then click on chlorophyll_a and then SST to get the images for those days. (Make sure there are SST and chlorophyll_a maps present for these days.) Either print the images on a color printer or open several browser windows so that you can switch back and forth to analyze the images.

Questions:

  1. Do you observe any interesting relationships in the Gulf of Mexico between the location of k. brevis blooms and chlorophyll_a? With SST?

  2. Look at the relationships between SST and chlorophyll_a along the eastern US Atlantic coast. What locations (be as specific as you can) appear to have the warmest SST? What locations appear to have the highest concentrations of chlorophyll_a? Do you suspect any correlation between the two variables?

  3. Where would you find information relating to any HAB outbreaks that occurred over the past year (2002)? Search the Internet to find out where the most recent outbreaks occurred. Once you have identified a specific time frame, go back to the NOAA/NESDIS and UM/RSMAS images and examine the k. brevis, SST, and chlorophyll_a data . Determine if there are any correlations.