Bio-Optical Monitoring and Evaluation System (BIOMES) for improving satellite estimates of Ocean Net Primary Production for Carbon Cycling and Climate Change studies

Joaquim Ignacio Goés,  Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory,  jig@ldeo.columbia.edu (Presenter)
Jinghui Wu,  Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory,  jinghuiw@ldeo.columbia.edu
Helga do Rosario Gomes,  Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory,  helga@ldeo.columbia.edu
Jianwei Wei,  NOAA / STAR,  jianwei.wei@noaa.gov
Ryan A Vandermeulen,  NOAA/STAR,  ryan.a.vandermeulen@nasa.gov
Michael Ondrusek,  NOAA/ STAR,  michael.ondrusek@noaa.gov
Zhongping Lee,  University of Massachusetts Boston,  zhongping.lee@umb.edu

One of the overarching goals of NASA’s CMS program is to promote and enhance the utility of its presently available and planned space based assets for better understanding of our planet’s carbon cycle and interactions among its atmospheric, terrestrial and aquatic carbon components. An essential requirement of this program is that sensors aboard these missions provide well calibrated, long-time series carbon related products of the highest quality and accuracy. For ocean ecosystems, accurate and well-characterized basin and global scale measurements of oceanic carbon dioxide draw down via phytoplankton photosynthesis, aka net primary production (NPP) are central to understanding the ocean carbon cycle, and the role and response of ocean ecosystems to rising CO2 levels and global warming. Despite considerable progress, current satellite oceanic NPP products continue to be beleaguered by uncertainties precluding their use for climate change studies. One of the problems, is that most global NPP products continue to rely on satellite estimates of phytoplankton biomass derived using ‘one-size-fits-all’ algorithms. Here we provide the first global maps of NPP that have been derived using the biomass independent absorption based model (AbPM), that is rooted in the bio-optical and photo-physiological characteristics of phytoplankton. To overcome the perennial problem of sparse shipboard measurements for scaling, validating and testing of our NPP model outputs, we have developed a novel Optical-Biogeochemical Classification (O-BGC) scheme, and a Bio-optical Monitoring and Evaluation System (BIOMES) approach to ensure that our NPP products are not only robust but valid over large spatial and temporal scales. We also provide a comparison of NPP estimates derived from AbPM with two other widely used models.

Poster Location ID: 1-23

Presentation Type: Poster

Session: Poster Session 1

Session Date: Tue (May 9) 5:00-7:00 PM

CCE Program: BDEC