Images & Animations
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Credit
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center, The SeaWiFS Project and ORBIMAGE, Scientific Visualization Studio. NOTE: All SeaWiFS images and data presented on this web site are for research and educational use only. All commercial use of SeaWiFS data must be coordinated with ORBIMAGE (http://www.orbimage.com).
Decadal Comparison of Plankton Levels
The global ocean chlorophyll archive produced by the CZCS was revised using compatible algorithms with SeaWiFS. Both archives were then blended with in situ data to reduce residual errors. This methodology permitted a quantitative comparison of decadal changes in global ocean chlorophyll from the CZCS (1979 - 1986) and SeaWiFS (1997 - 2000) records. Global spatial distributions and seasonal variablility of ocean chlorophyll were similar, but global means decreased over the two observational segments. Major changes were observed regionally: chlorophyll concentrations decreased in the northern high latitudes while chlorophyll in the low latitudes increased. Mid-ocean gyres exhibited limited changes. The overall spatial and seasonal similarity of the two data records suggests that the changes are due to natural variability. These results provide evidence of how the Earth's climate may be changing and how ocean biota respond.
SeaWiFS data for the Atlantic Ocean with black land
Metadata
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Sensor
OrbView-2/SeaWiFS -
Animation ID
2497 -
Video ID
None -
Start Timecode
00:00:00:00 -
End Timecode
00:00:00:00 -
Animator
Joycelyn Thomson -
Studio
SVS -
Visualization Date
2002/07/30 -
Scientist
Watson Gregg (NASA/GSFC) -
Keywords
Chlorophyll, Plankton, GCMD--Location--Atlantic Ocean, GCMD--Location--Pacific Ocean -
DLESE Subject
Biological oceanography, Chemical oceanography, Hydrology, Ecology -
Data Date
CZCS (1979-1986), SeaWiFS (1997-2000) -
Animation Type
Stills -
Airchecks
Aviation Week and Space Technology, Aug. 19, 2002 issue, p. 17
