Some NASA researchers are switching their focus from the skies to the seas to improve ocean floor mapping A user playing the new NeMO-Net game that helps NASA classify the world's coral. Source:  NASA/Ames Research Center/Ved ChirayathA user playing the new NeMO-Net game that helps NASA classify the world's coral. Source: NASA/Ames Research Center/Ved Chirayathcapabilities. Technologies based on fluid lensing are under development to enable imaging through the ocean surface and provide details of the ocean floor of which only 4% is currently documented. The agency is also requesting the aid of citizen scientists in locating and identifying coral ecosystems captured in these images.

Coral is one of Earth’s oldest life forms and one of the few that is visible from space. These ecosystems are deteriorating rapidly, pointing to the need for accurate tracking to gauge conditions and develop remedial measures. Satellites equipped with fluid lensing instruments will perform the tracking while citizen scientists who are game will aid with coral identification and classification.

[See also Fluid Lensing Generates Clear Underwater Images Through Ocean Waves]

NeMO-Net — Neural Multi-Modal Observation and Training Network — is a publicly accessible game allowing users to interact with NASA data of the ocean floor and highlight coral found in these images. Game playing will provide data for the NASA Pleiades supercomputer to process and train an algorithm to accurately identify coral in any imagery.

Both fluid lensing and gaming opportunities can be leveraged to map the ocean floor with a level of detail previously possible only when teams of divers were sent under water to take photographs.

To contact the author of this article, email shimmelstein@globalspec.com