Optical remote sensing in the water column

Project Member(s): Ajani, P.

Funding or Partner Organisation: NSW Department of Industry (New South Wales Smart Sensing Network)
NSW Department of Industry (New South Wales Smart Sensing Network)

Start year: 2021

Summary: The recently successful Transforming Australian Shellfish Production Project (TASPP) is a UTS led, multidisciplinary collaboration between oyster farmers (NSW Farmers Association), researchers (UTS, DPI Aquaculture and Fisheries), regulators (DPI Biosecurity and Food Safety) and the Food Agility CRC. The $1.4M project uses real time, high-resolution salinity and temperature sensing, combined with novel molecular genetic methods (eDNA), to model oyster food safety, pathogenic bacteria, harmful algae, and oyster growth and disease, with the aim of changing harvest management plans to reduce harvest closure days for farmers. The NSSN Grand Challenge Grant Optical Remote Sensing in the Water Column will build on the TASPP, to explore and evaluate optical remote sensing methods for systematic 3D mapping subsurface water temperature, salinity, dissolved oxygen, and pigments such as chlorophyll and phycocyanin. In this project, Dr Ajani (SoLS) will continue her successful collaborations with Prof Pask and colleagues from other state water agencies and universities, to work on the most up to date technology in this field. Successful outcomes would likely lead to collaboration with a commercial partner or even a technology spinoff company for future sensor production.

FOR Codes: Marine and estuarine ecology (incl. marine ichthyology), Fish pests and diseases, Marine Oceanic Processes (excl. climate related), Oceanic processes (excl. in the Antarctic and Southern Ocean)