Preprints
Filtering by Subject: Marine Biology
Redefining Uncertainty: A Complete Bayesian Workflow for Ocean Color Remote Sensing
Published: 2025-08-28
Subjects: Environmental Monitoring, Marine Biology, Oceanography, Oceanography and Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology, Other Earth Sciences
Traditional satellite ocean color algorithms for chlorophyll-a and inherent optical property retrieval rely on deterministic regression models that typically produce single-point predictions without explicit uncertainty quantification. The absence of uncertainty awareness undermines in-situ/model match-ups, reduces predictive reliability, and ultimately erodes user confidence. In the present [...]
The Grand Challenges of WPI-AIMEC: Executive Summary
Published: 2025-08-21
Subjects: Biodiversity, Biology, Climate, Databases and Information Systems, Earth Sciences, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Environmental Microbiology and Microbial Ecology Life Sciences, Environmental Monitoring, Environmental Sciences, Environmental Studies, Geographic Information Sciences, Marine Biology, Nature and Society Relations, Oceanography, Oceanography and Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology, Planetary Biogeochemistry, Remote Sensing, Sustainability
The ocean has a heat capacity 1,000 times greater than that of the atmosphere and stores 50 times more carbon comparatively, thus, constituting a major sink of anthropogenically released greenhouse gases. Warming effects of human activities on the climate system are now undeniably shown to impact marine life and ecosystems, both directly via warming of the ocean and/or indirectly altering ocean [...]
22 Years Later: Evaluating Glover & Smith’s 2003 Predictions of the 2025 Deep-Sea Ecosystem
Published: 2025-08-08
Subjects: Life Sciences, Marine Biology
Earth’s deep-sea ecosystem remains one of the least explored and understood ecosystems on the planet. Human interest in the resources available in the deep-sea must be balanced with potential harm to the deep-sea ecosystem. Accurately predicting the effect on human impact on the deep-sea floor can help guide policies and actions today. This research evaluates prior predictions of human impact on [...]
Bridging Ancestral Knowledge and Ecosystem Science for Coastal Restoration in Latin America
Published: 2025-08-04
Subjects: Biodiversity, Biology, Cell and Developmental Biology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Forest Sciences, Life Sciences, Marine Biology, Microbiology, Research Methods in Life Sciences, Systems Biology
Peer-review status: This manuscript has not been peer-reviewed. It is a preprint submitted for public dissemination and open feedback. This study documents the CALISUR methodology, a community-based mangrove restoration model rooted in ancestral ecological knowledge and applied across six intervention sites in the Gulf of Guayaquil. The methodology integrates scientific and traditional practices [...]
PhyX - Predicting Phytoplankton Community Composition from Satellite Ocean Color
Published: 2025-08-02
Subjects: Marine Biology
The way in which phytoplankton communities are structured - often referred to as phytoplankton community composition (PCC) - exerts fundamental control on ocean biogeochemical cycling, climate regulation, and marine ecosystem dynamics. Accurate quantification of these groups from satellite ocean color data remains challenging due to spectral similarities among phytoplankton types and the [...]
An explainable machine learning prediction system for early-warning of heat stress on Florida’s Coral Reef
Published: 2025-06-25
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Environmental Sciences, Marine Biology, Oceanography and Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology, Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Coral reefs are facing increasing threats from rising ocean temperatures, necessitating timely and localized prediction tools to inform reef management and conservation. This study introduces a machine learning framework capable of forecasting the onset of moderate coral heat stress at site-specific resolution on Florida’s Coral Reef. Leveraging the XGBoost algorithm, the data-driven prediction [...]
Assessment of heavy metal contamination in seawater, sediments, and fish tissues from Msimbazi Bay, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.
Published: 2025-06-25
Subjects: Life Sciences, Marine Biology, Pharmacology, Toxicology and Environmental Health
Heavy metal pollution in marine environments is a growing concern globally due to its potential threats to aquatic ecosystems and human health. Major industrial zones in Tanzania, including Dar es Salaam city, significantly contribute to heavy metal pollution in aquatic ecosystems. The samples for heavy metal analysis in seawater, sediments, and fish tissues were collected, prepared, and [...]
Coral microatoll partial mortality after multi-hour subaerial exposure: Implications for relative sea-level studies
Published: 2025-05-30
Subjects: Geomorphology, Marine Biology, Other Earth Sciences, Other Oceanography and Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology
Some intertidal corals, known as microatolls, have a distinct morphology that reflects changes in local relative sea level. While past observations have shown that the top surface of these corals may be killed by subaerial exposure, little is known about the exact oceanographic or environmental conditions that cause a coral to die down to a particular level. Here, we combine field surveys, [...]
Coral Reefs Span Borders, So Must Solutions: A Blueprint for International Cooperation for Coral Reef Conservation in Complex Political Environments
Published: 2025-05-23
Subjects: Biodiversity, Environmental Studies, Marine Biology
Coral reefs face escalating threats from climate change, yet reducing greenhouse gas emissions alone will not ensure their survival. Local and regional conservation efforts are urgently needed to address immediate, human-induced stressors and build resilience. Although conservation often begins locally, the interconnected nature of reef systems that span borders demands transboundary management, [...]
Temporal dynamics of biotic homogenization and differentiation across marine fish communities
Published: 2025-04-20
Subjects: Marine Biology
Humans have transformed ecosystems through habitat modification, harvesting, species introduction, and climate change. Changes in species distribution and composition are often thought to induce biotic homogenization, defined as a decline in spatial beta diversity through time. However, it is unclear whether homogenization is common in ocean ecosystems and if changes in beta diversity exhibit [...]
Temporal dynamics of biotic homogenization and differentiation across marine fish communities
Published: 2025-01-08
Subjects: Marine Biology
Humans have transformed ecosystems through habitat modification, harvesting, species introduction, and climate change. Changes in species distribution and composition are often thought to induce biotic homogenization, defined as a decline in spatial beta diversity through time. However, it is unclear whether homogenization is common in ocean ecosystems and if changes in beta diversity exhibit [...]
Towards statistical modeling of chlorophyll-a concentrations in Balikpapan Bay, Indonesia: Implications for algal bloom detection
Published: 2024-10-26
Subjects: Artificial Intelligence and Robotics, Biogeochemistry, Environmental Monitoring, Marine Biology, Oceanography
This study presents a comprehensive statistical analysis of chlorophyll-a dynamics in Balikpapan Bay, Indonesia, combining time series analysis, extreme value modeling, and machine learning techniques to understand phytoplankton variability near Indonesia's planned new capital city. Analysis of daily chlorophyll-a concentrations (2019-2021) revealed a non-Gaussian distribution (skewness = 2.212, [...]
Seasonal variability of coccolith fluxes in sediment traps of the Perdido and Coatzacoalcos regions in the Southern Gulf of Mexico
Published: 2024-10-17
Subjects: Marine Biology
We present new results of the coccolith fluxes in the Perdido and Coatzacoalcos regions of the Gulf of Mexico and explore the environmental variables that may control them. Two sediment trap moorings located at a water depth of 1100 m collected settling particles from June 2016 to July 2017. Both regions showed similar seasonal distributions in total coccolith fluxes, with the highest recorded [...]
A Community-Centric Intelligent Cyberinfrastructure for Addressing Nitrogen Pollution using Web Systems and Conversational AI
Published: 2024-09-12
Subjects: Agricultural Science, Agriculture, Environmental Studies, Marine Biology, Pharmacology, Toxicology and Environmental Health
The Blue-Green Action Platform (BlueGAP) information system (IS) is an intelligent cyberinfrastructure framework designed to support large-scale water quality assessments in the context of demographic statistics and community stories about water issues. The system prioritizes collaboration with interested parties in three pilot watersheds with test cases implemented in US locations including [...]
Carbon storage in Northern Ireland’s aquatic ecosystems: an evidence synthesis to support policy development.
Published: 2024-09-06
Subjects: Biogeochemistry, Marine Biology, Oceanography
Blue carbon is defined as carbon that is naturally sequestered and stored in the world’s aquatic ecosystems. Governments around the world are currently seeking to develop a range of tools to help meet their commitments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and potentially reverse anthropogenic climate change. As such, there is growing interest from policy makers in natural processes which may be [...]