Abstract
ABSTRACT Trichodesmium , a major colonial cyanobacterial nitrogen fixer, forms large blooms in tropical oligotrophic oceans and enhances CO 2 sequestration by the ocean due to its ability to fix dissolved dinitrogen, however, its detection by satellite has not yet been successful in the South Western Tr opical Pacific. Here, an algorithm has been developed for discriminating radiance anomalies observed in SeaWiFS imager y over the summertime Tropi cal Pacific. Its validation used 70 in situ observations of Trichodesmium accumulations for the period 1997-2004. The fraction of pixels identified as Trichodesmium in the region 5°S-25°S 160°E-190°E is low (between 0.1 and 0.5%) but is about100 times higher than previous algorithms indicate. The algorithm re produces the observed seasonal and inter-annual variability of Trichodesmium blooms in the SWTP. Keywords: Trichodesmium , remote sensing, ocean color, algorithm, SeaWiFS 1. INTRODUCTION Oceanic N2 fixation is a process which has b een postulated to regulate atmospheric CO
Published Version
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