An Optical Model for the Remote-Sensing of Absorption Coefficients of Phytoplankton in Oceanic/Coastal Waters

Surya Prakash Tiwari, Palanisamy Shanmugam

Department of Ocean Engineering,Indian Institute of Technology Madras, Chennai, India.

DOI: 10.4236/ars.2012.12003                

Abstract

A new model for the remote sensing of absorption coefficients of phytoplankton a_ph (λ) in oceanic and coastal waters is developed and tested with SeaWiFS and MODIS-Aqua data. The model is derived from a rela-tionship of the remote sensing reflectance ratio R_rs (670)/R_rs (490) and a_ph (490) and a_ph (670) (from large in-situ data sets). When compared with over 470 independent in-situ data sets, the model provides accurate retrievals of the a_ph (λ) across the visible spectrum, with mean relative error less than 8%, slope close to unity and R2 greater than 0.8. Further comparison of the SeaWiFS-derived a_ph (λ) with in-situ a_ph (λ) values gives similar and consistent results. The model when used for analysis of MODIS-Aqua imagery, provides more realistic values of the phytoplankton absorption coefficients capturing spatial structures of the massive algal blooms in surface waters of the Arabian Sea. These results demonstrate that the new algorithm works well for both the coastal and open ocean waters observed and suggest a potential of using remote sensing to provide knowledge on the shape of phytoplankton absorption spectra that are a requirement in many inverse models to estimate phytoplankton pigment concentrations and for input into bio-optical models that predict carbon fixation rates for the global ocean.

Keywords

Remote Sensing; Phytoplankton Absorption; Bio-Optical Models; Coastal Waters; MODIS-Aqua; SeaWiFS; Arabian Sea

Conflicts of Interest

The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

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