Demonstrating an Effective Marine Biodiversity Observation Network in the Santa Barbara Channel
Lead PI: Dr. Bob Miller, University of California, Santa Barbara
Start Year: 2014 | Duration: 5 Years
Partners: University of California, Santa Barbara, University of California, San Diego, NOAA Ocean Exploration and Research, NOAA Southwest Fisheries Science Center
This project will build a comprehensive demonstration system that includes representation of all levels of biotic diversity, develops key new tools to expand the scales of present observation, and produces a data management network to integrate new and existing data sources. The system will be scalable to expand into a full regional Marine BON, and most importantly the methods and decision support tools we develop will be transferable to other regions. Incorporating a broad set of habitats including nearshore coast, estuaries, continental shelf, and pelagic, and taxonomic breadth from microbes to whales will facilitate this transferability. This demonstration BON will deliver important new information that will facilitate management decisions, and will provide information and recommendations to improve monitoring efficiency for key federal and state agencies in the area, including the National Park Service, NOAA’s Office of National Marine Sanctuaries and National Marine Fisheries Service, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, U.S. Geological Survey, and California Department of Fish and Wildlife. This project has three broad objectives: 1) integrate biodiversity data to enable inferences about regional biodiversity, 2) develop advanced methods in optical and acoustic imaging and genomics for monitoring biodiversity, and 3) implement a tradeoff framework that optimizes allocation of sampling effort
Annual PI Reports
FY 2015 PI Report