coral reef mapping

Surveying the Reefs of Lana’i – by Air and by Sea

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As the sun begins to rise over the island ridges of Lana’i, Hawai’i, the drone lifts off from its landing pad on the beach and begins to fly a grid along the coast, imaging the nearshore coral reefs. The drone is being flown by Dr. Ved Chirayath from the University of Miami Rosenstiel School of Marine, Atmospheric, and Earth Science’s Aircraft Center for Earth Studies (ACES). Ved has pioneered a new approach to mapping reefs using drones equipped with fluid lensing technology. While this cutting-edge technology is capturing reefs by air, the need for in-water validation of those images and census of marine life is critical to understanding the status of this coral reef ecosystem. And that is where my expertise comes into play.

I have been surveying reefs all over the world for the past 10 years, and I am excited to be putting my skill set to use again in the field. Traditional underwater surveys of both the benthic and fish communities, combined with drone surveys, gives the most detailed information regarding the health of the coral reef ecosystem…

Surveying Coral Reefs in Hawaii with ACES

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Earlier this year, the Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation joined Dr. Ved Chirayath on a research mission to survey and map coral reefs in Lana’i, Hawaii. Chirayath leads the University of Miami’s Rosenstiel School of Marine, Atmospheric, and Earth Science’s Aircraft Center for Earth Studies (ACES), and has pioneered a new approach to mapping reefs using drones equipped with fluid lensing technology.

Fluid lensing harnesses the unique power of waves to magnify and concentrate light on the seafloor, essentially allowing users to see through the water and map the seafloor in stunning detail…

StoryMaps: A New Way to Explore our Findings from the Global Reef Expedition

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My name is Joana, and I am an IMBRSea student. This spring, I have had the incredible opportunity to intern at the Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation. During this time, I helped the Foundation create StoryMaps to tell key conservation stories about the Global Reef Expedition. I produced three StoryMaps showcasing the findings and data collected during the Expedition.

My first StoryMap, Mapping Our Planet’s Coral Reefs, was the first of its kind published by the Living Oceans Foundation. This StoryMap guides user through the World Reef Map, showing people how to use it. A proper understanding of the detailed information available in the web-based map will help policymakers, local communities, and conservation organizations establish conservation plans to fight the unfolding coral reef crisis.

The second StoryMap takes users aboard the Global Reef Expedition, showing them what is happening to coral reefs around the globe. This StoryMap includes information on the scientific surveys carried out, the methodology used to map coral reefs, and the discoveries over a 10-year mission around the globe.

The last StoryMap, Lessons Learned from the Global Reef Expedition, highlights the five take-home messages of the Global Reef Expedition. The coral reef crisis was apparent in every location surveyed, and swift action is needed to conserve our planet’s coral reefs.

A New Model of Coral Reef Health

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Scientists have developed a new way to model and map the health of coral reef ecosystems using data collected on the Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation’s Global Reef Expedition. This innovative method, presented today at the International Coral Reef Symposium (ICRS), can determine which natural and anthropogenic factors are most likely to lead to persistently vibrant coral and fish communities. Their findings can help scientists identify the reefs most likely to survive in a changing world.

The new models are a first step in being able to produce maps of global coral reef resilience.

The Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation Partners with NASA to Accelerate the Mapping of the World’s Coral Reefs

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Coral reefs are in crisis. Corals are an ancient life form and, because of the reefs that they build, the survival of countless other organisms is predicated on healthy coral ecosystems. But coral reefs are dying at an alarming rate. …

Mapping the abyssal depths of the Northern Red Sea

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During a month-long expedition in 2007, the Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation (KSLOF) conducted a comprehensive assessment of the coral reefs situated in the Ras Qisbah region of the northern Saudi Arabian Red Sea. Thirteen years later, KSLOF Chief Scientist Sam Purkis is embarking on a return mission to revisit this area and extend the mapping of the shallow-water reefs conducted by KSLOF into the abyssal depths of the Northern Red Sea.

Our coral reef mapping paper is one of the most popular articles in Coral Reefs this year

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The Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation (KSLOF) would like to congratulate our science team for having one of the most popular papers in the prestigious journal, Coral Reefs. Last week the journal announced that our coral reef mapping paper, High-resolution habitat and bathymetry maps for 65,000 sq. km of Earth’s remotest coral reefs, was one of the top three most accessed articles published in the past 12 months.

“After spending five years surveying and mapping some of most remote coral reefs in the world on the Global Reef Expedition, it is heartening to see our years of hard work getting the attention it deserves in the scientific community,” said Alexandra Dempsey, KSLOF’s Director of Science Management and a co-author of the paper.

Our paper in Coral Reefs showed how we created high-resolution maps of coral reefs on the Global Reef Expedition using a combination of satellite data and field observations.

Living Oceans Foundation scientists complete largest comprehensive study of French Polynesia’s coral reefs

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The Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation is proud to release our findings from the largest coral reef survey and mapping expedition ever conducted in French Polynesia. The Global Reef Expedition: French Polynesia Final Report provides a comprehensive summary of the …

AI for Earth

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Microsoft’s Artificial Intelligence (AI) for Earth program is harnessing the power of the Global Reef Expedition dataset to build a predictive model of global coral reef health and resilience. Anna Bakker, a Ph.D. student working with KSLOF’s Chief Scientist Dr. Sam Purkis on remote sensing of coral reefs, was awarded the Microsoft AI for Earth Grant for the duration of her Ph.D. This program will grant us access to use the immense power of AI, machine learning, and cloud computing to analyze the data collected during the Global Reef Expedition.