St. Petersburg Coastal and Marine Science Center
Publications
Underwater photographic reconnaissance and habitat data collection in the Florida Keys—A procedure for ground truthing remotely sensed bathymetric data
Bathymetric geoprocessing analyses of the Florida Reef Tract have provided insights into trends of seafloor accretion and seafloor erosion over time and following major storm events. However, bathymetric surveys sometimes capture manmade structures and vegetation, which do not represent the desired bare-earth data. Therefore, ground truthing is...
Fehr, Zachery W.; Yates, Kimberly K.
Reestablishing a stepping-stone population of the threatened elkhorn coral Acropora palmata to aid regional recovery
Recovery of the elkhorn coral Acropora palmata is critical to reversing coral reef ecosystem collapse in the western Atlantic, but the species is severely threatened. To gauge potential for the species’ restoration in Florida, USA, we conducted an assisted migration experiment where 50 coral fragments of 5 nursery-raised genetic strains...
Kuffner, Ilsa B.; Stathakopoulos, Anastasios; Toth, Lauren T.; Bartlett, Lucy Development and application of an empirical dune growth model for evaluating barrier island recovery from storms
Coastal zone managers require models that predict barrier island change on decadal time scales to estimate coastal vulnerability, and plan habitat restoration and coastal protection projects. To meet these needs, methods must be available for predicting dune recovery as well as dune erosion. In the present study, an empirical dune growth model (...
Dalyander, Patricia (Soupy); Mickey, Rangley C.; Passeri, Davina L.; Plant, Nathaniel G. Sensitivity of storm response to antecedent topography in the XBeach model
Antecedent topography is an important aspect of coastal morphology when studying and forecasting coastal change hazards. The uncertainty in morphologic response of storm-impact models and their use in short-term hazard forecasting and decadal forecasting is important to account for when considering a coupled model framework. This study provided a...
Mickey, Rangley C.; Dalyander, P. Soupy; McCall, Robert T.; Passeri, Davina L. Simulating wave runup on an intermediate–reflective beach using a wave-resolving and a wave-averaged version of XBeach
The prediction of wave runup, as well as its components, time-averaged setup and the time-varying swash, is a key element of coastal storm hazard assessments, as wave runup controls the transitions between morphodynamic response types such as dune erosion and overwash, and the potential for flooding by wave overtopping. While theoretically able to...
de beer, A.F.; McCall, R.T.; Long, Joseph W.; Tissier, M.F.S.; Reniers, A.J.H.M. The roles of storminess and sea level rise in decadal barrier island evolution
Models of alongshore sediment transport during quiescent conditions, storm‐driven barrier island morphology, and poststorm dune recovery are integrated to assess decadal barrier island evolution under scenarios of increased sea levels and variability in storminess (intensity and frequency). Model results indicate barrier island response regimes of...
Passeri, Davina L.; Dalyander, P. Soupy; Long, Joseph W.; Mickey, Rangley C.; Jenkins, Robert L.; Thompson, David M.; Plant, Nathaniel G.; Godsey, Elizabeth; Gonzalez, Victor SurfRCaT: A tool for remote calibration of pre-existing coastal cameras to enable their use as quantitative coastal monitoring tools
The Surf-camera Remote Calibration Tool (SurfRCaT) is a Python-based software application to calibrate and rectify images from pre-existing video cameras that are operating at coastal sites in the United States. The software enables remote camera calibration and subsequent image rectification by facilitating the remote-extraction of ground control...
Conlin, Matthew P.; Adams, Peter N; Wilkinson, Benjamin; Dusek, Gregory; Palmsten, Margaret Louise; Brown, Jenna A. Identifying mangrove-coral habitats in the Florida Keys
Coral reefs are degrading due to many synergistic stressors. Recently there have been a number of global reports of corals occupying mangrove habitats that provide a supportive environment or refugium for corals, sheltering them by reducing stressors such as oxidative light stress and low pH. This study used satellite imagery and manual ground-...
Kellogg, Christina A.; Moyer, Ryan P.; Jacobsen, Mary; Yates, Kimberly K.
Cliff Feature Delineation Tool and Baseline Builder version 1.0 user guide
Coastal cliffs constitute 80 percent of the world’s coastline, with seacliffs fronting a large proportion of the U.S. West Coast shoreline, particularly in California. Erosion of coastal cliffs can threaten infrastructure and human life, yet the spatial and temporal scope of cliff studies have been limited by cumbersome traditional methods that...
Seymour, Alexander C.; Hapke, Cheryl J.; Warrick, Jonathan Data-driven, multi-model workflow suggests strong influence from hurricanes on the generation of turbidity currents in the Gulf of Mexico
Turbidity currents deliver sediment rapidly from the continental shelf to the slope and beyond; and can be triggered by processes such as shelf resuspension during oceanic storms; mass failure of slope deposits due to sediment- and wave-pressure loadings; and localized events that grow into sustained currents via self-amplifying ignition. Because...
Harris, Courtney K.; Syvitski, Jaia; Arango, H.G.; Meiburg, E. H.; Cohen, Sagy; Jenkins, C.J.; Birchler, Justin J.; Hutton, E. W. H.; Kniskern, T. A.; Radhakrishnan, S.; Auad, Guillermo Acidification in the U.S. Southeast: Causes, potential consequences and the role of the Southeast Ocean and Coastal Acidification Network
Coastal acidification in southeastern U.S. estuaries and coastal waters is influenced by biological activity, run-off from the land, and increasing carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Acidification can negatively impact coastal resources such as shellfish, finfish, and coral reefs, and the communities that rely on them. Organismal responses for...
Hall, Emily R.; Wickes, Leslie; Burnett, Louis; Scott, Geoffrey I.; Hernandez, Debra; Yates, Kimberly K.; Barbero, Leticia; Reimer, Janet J.; Baalousha, Mohammed; Mintz, Jennifer; Cai, Wei-Jun; Craig, J. Kevin; DeVoe, M. Richard; Fisher, William S.; Hathaway, Terri K.; Jewett, Elizabeth B.; Johnson, Zackary; Keener, Paula; Mordecai, Rua S.; Noakes, Scott; Phillips, Charlie; Sandifer, Paul; Schnetzer, Astrid; Styron, Jay Accurate bathymetric maps from underwater digital imagery without ground control
Structure-from-Motion (SfM) photogrammetry can be used with digital underwater photographs to generate high-resolution bathymetry and orthomosaics with millimeter-to-centimeter scale resolution at relatively low cost. Although these products are useful for assessing species diversity and health, they have additional utility for quantifying benthic...
Hatcher, Gerry; Warrick, Jonathan; Ritchie, Andrew C.; Dailey, Evan; Zawada, David G.; Kranenburg, Christine; Yates, Kimberly K.