Bio-optical studies in the Argentine Sea

DOGLIOTTI, A.I.; WILLIAMS, G.; SIMIONATO, C.G.; LUTZ, V.; GOSSN, J.I; TROPPER, I.

Buenos Aires

Encuentro; 10th Aquarius/SAC-D Science Meeting; 2015

CONAE

The Argentine shelf andits shelf-break comprise a large and rich biological area of the ocean. This isone of the widest and flattestcontinental shelves in the world ocean characterized by the presence of watermasses with different properties due to the presence of algal blooms, coastalupwellings, shelf-break and tidal fronts, and river discharges. Remote sensingof ocean color has demonstrated to be a very useful tool for monitoring themarine ecosystem providing near real-time, long-term, synoptic, globalestimates of key parameters, such as surface chlorophyll-a (chl-a)concentration. Strong efforts have been recently put in collecting bio-opticaldata, including radiometric and inherent optical properties measurements. This invaluable andscarce information will help improving atmosphericcorrection algorithms, as well as validating and calibrating satellite-derivedproducts of current and future ocean colour missions like the Argentinean-Brazilian joint ocean colour satellite mission SABIA/Mar. Inthis presentation we will show the main results of different bio-opticalstudies that have been performed in the Argentine Sea.These include the validation of satellite-derived products and algorithms, thedevelopment of a general turbidity algorithm, the evaluation of atmosphericcorrection algorithms in the extreme turbid waters of Río de la Plata river,and primary production modeling using field and remotely sensed data.