Citizen Science approaches for beach litter monitoring

Questa tesi dal titolo "Approcci della scienza dei cittadini per il monitoraggio dei rifiuti da spiaggia" si concentra sui rifiuti marini delle spiagge (di seguito MBL). MBL rappresenta un enorme problema che riguarda le aree scientifiche, economiche e sociali. Durante il primo anno di dottorato è stata organizzata e realizzata un'attività pilota di citizen science per il monitoraggio dell'ambiente balneare con studenti delle scuole primarie e secondarie, utilizzando il protocollo MAC-Emerso. Le osservazioni raccolte sono state incluse nel database ufficiale MAC-Emerso. Durante il secondo anno, è stata completata un'analisi bibliometrica sul MBL e i risultati raggiunti sono stati organizzati per la pubblicazione in una rivista peer-reviewed. Inoltre, è stata effettuata un'analisi preliminare del database nazionale MAC-Emerso disponibile. Il terzo anno è stato dedicato alla compilazione di studi e programmi precedenti incentrati sul monitoraggio MBL e sulle campagne di bonifica lungo la costa mediterranea. Tutte le metodologie applicate fino ad oggi sono state analizzate e confrontate nel dettaglio per identificare i punti di forza e di debolezza dei protocolli attuali, il coinvolgimento dei cittadini e le lacune esistenti. La presente tesi è composta da otto capitoli e due articoli e si apre con un'introduzione generale che descrive MBL (Capitolo 1). Il capitolo 2 discute l'obiettivo generale della ricerca di dottorato e riassume gli articoli inclusi nella tesi di dottorato. Il capitolo 3 esamina in dettaglio la strategia marina, mentre il capitolo 4 si concentra sulla scienza dei cittadini e sul protocollo MAC-Emerso. Il capitolo 5 descrive i principali risultati raggiunti, inclusa l'attività pilota di citizen science organizzata e realizzata per il monitoraggio dell'ambiente balneare con gli studenti delle scuole primarie e secondarie che utilizzano il protocollo MAC-Emerso. Il capitolo 6 comprende la raccolta dei due articoli scientifici su MBL realizzati durante le attività di dottorato. Il primo paper (Cesarano et al., 2021) è stato pubblicato su Marine Pollution Bulletin (con ranking Q1), mentre il secondo paper è stato recentemente inviato alla stessa rivista. Il primo esplora la letteratura scientifica globale sull'MBL attraverso un'accurata analisi bibliometrica. Quest'ultimo presenta una revisione sistematica della letteratura corrente sul monitoraggio MBL lungo le coste del Mediterraneo. Insieme, forniscono una revisione completa delle conoscenze scientifiche sull'MBL nella regione mediterranea e offrono spunti interessanti per capire dove si trovano le lacune attuali e cosa sarebbe necessario per sviluppare un monitoraggio più efficiente su scala di bacino a sostegno dei nostri sforzi per affrontare il Sfida MBL. Infine, un'osservazione conclusiva dei risultati complessivi raggiunti nel presente studio è elaborata nel Capitolo 7. Segue una nota sugli altri prodotti non inclusi in questa tesi, ma eseguiti durante il mio periodo di dottorato. Quindi, un elenco di riferimento degli studi menzionati attraverso la tesi conclude questo documento.This thesis entitled “Citizen Science approaches for beach litter monitoring” focuses on Marine Beach Litter (hereafter MBL). MBL represents a huge problem that concerns scientific, economic, and social areas. During the first year of my PhD, a pilot citizen science activity was organized and realized for monitoring beach environment with primary and secondary school students, using the MAC-Emerso protocol. The collected observations were included in the official MAC-Emerso database. During the second year, a bibliometric analysis on the MBL topic has been completed and the achieved results have been organized for publication in a peer-reviewed journal. Furthermore, a preliminary analysis of the available national MAC-Emerso database was carried out. The third year was devoted to compile previous studies and programs focusing on MBL monitoring and cleanup campaigns along the Mediterranean coastline. All the methodologies applied to date have been analysed and compared in detail to identify strengths and weaknesses of current protocols, citizen involvement, and existing gaps. The present thesis consists of eight chapters and two papers and opens with a general introduction describing MBL (Chapter 1). Chapter 2 discusses the overall aim of the PhD research, and summarizes the papers included in the PhD thesis. Chapter 3 examines in detail the Marine Strategy, while Chapter 4 focuses on Citizen Science and the MAC-Emerso protocol. Chapter 5 describes the main results achieved, including the pilot citizen science activity organized and realized for monitoring beach environment with primary and secondary school students using the MAC-Emerso protocol. Chapter 6 includes the collection of the two scientific papers on MBL realized during the PhD activities. The first paper (Cesarano et al., 2021) has been published in Marine Pollution Bulletin (with Q1 ranking), while the second paper has been recently submitted to the same journal. The former explores the global scientific literature on MBL through an accurate bibliometric analysis. The latter presents a systematic review of current literature concerning MBL monitoring along the Mediterranean coasts. Together, they do provide a comprehensive review of the scientific knowledge on MBL in the Mediterranean region and offer interesting insights to understand where current gaps lie, and what would be needed to develop a basin-scale more efficient monitoring in support of our efforts to tackle the MBL challenge. Finally, a concluding remark of the overall results achieved in the present study is elaborated in Chapter 7. A note about the other products not included in this thesis, but performed during my PhD period, follows. Then, a reference list of the studies mentioned through the thesis ends this document

On the use of ABACUS high resolution glider observations for the assessment of phytoplankton ocean biomass from CMEMS model products

Ocean biomass distribution has a growing importance in the world economy as a global strategic reserve, due to environmental and industrial applications and its variability related to climate change. Satellite imagery allows multi-resolution methodologies to obtain estimation, and hopefully classification, of biomass content over sea surface. This information is largely used in numerical simulations and nowadays represents an important contribute to future projections. Nevertheless, satellite, models and classical in situ monitoring resolution/accuracy sometimes cannot provide data at the finer spatial scales needed to describe the complex three-dimensional water column system. On the other hand, glider surveys allow scientists to collect observations of ocean phenomena at very high resolution along the water column, to assess numerical simulations reliability and, eventually, to assimilate these data into ocean models. In this study, we present a quantitative comparison between the glider observations collected in the Algerian Basin (Western Mediterranean Sea) during the ABACUS surveys from 2014 to 2018, and the daily outputs of two co-located CMEMS model products (i.e., GLB and IBI). The achieved results point out that model products are well correlated with glider potential temperature measurements but they still need improvements to provide a correct representation of the chlorophyll concentration variability in the study area. Generally, IBI daily simulations present higher linear correlation with concurrent glider in situ data than GLB ones. IBI products also reproduce better the pattern of the local maxima of chlorophyll concentration across the Algerian Basin. Nevertheless, they largely underestimate glider chlorophyll measurements and present significant differences that limit their capability to reproduce its upper ocean concentration that is needed for accomplishing advanced ecological studies.This work was realized in the framework of the PON R&I 2014–2020 “AIM – Attraction and International Mobility” at Università degli Studi di Napoli Parthenope. Glider missions were performed in the framework of the Algerian BAsin Circulation Unmanned Survey (ABACUS) observational projects. The ABACUS 1 missions (2014) were supported by the Joint European Research Infrastructure network for Coastal Observatories (JERICO) TransNational Access (TNA) third call (grant agreement no. 262584). The ABACUS 2 missions (2015) were realized through the SOCIB glider facility open access programme. The research leading to ABACUS 3 (2016) and ABACUS 4 (2017 and 2018) was supported by the European Union's H2020 Framework Programme (h2020-INFRAIA-2014–2015) (JERICOsingle bondNEXT grant agreement no. 654410).Peer reviewe

Scientific knowledge on marine beach litter: A bibliometric analysis

none5noneCesarano, Cinzia; Aulicino, Giuseppe; Cerrano, Carlo; Ponti, Massimo; Puce, StefaniaCesarano, Cinzia; Aulicino, Giuseppe; Cerrano, Carlo; Ponti, Massimo; Puce, Stefani

Marine beach litter monitoring strategies along Mediterranean coasts. A methodological review

: Marine beach litter (MBL) represents a serious issue for marine life, coastal ecosystems, human health and several economical activities. The Mediterranean Sea is a semi enclosed basin particularly vulnerable to this problem. Its coasts are threatened by critical anthropogenic pressures that sum up with intensive fishing and shipping, and the slow turnover of its waters. In the last decades, several scientific and participative initiatives have been conducted to study, monitor and clean-up shorelines. These studies were generally characterized by differences in timing and frequency of the surveys, as well as in litter sampling, classification and analysis. This paper presents a systematic review of current literature concerning MBL monitoring strategies along the Mediterranean coasts. Scopus indexed studies are analysed to identify discrepancies and similarities among the applied protocols, understand where current gaps lie, and point out what would be needed to develop a basin-scale efficient monitoring for the Mediterranean Sea

In Situ and Satellite Sea Surface Salinity in the Algerian Basin Observed through ABACUS Glider Measurements and BEC SMOS Regional Products

Special Issue Ten Years of Remote Sensing at Barcelona Expert Center.-- 26 pages, 16 figures, 2 tablesThe Algerian Basin is a key area for the general circulation in the western Mediterranean Sea. The basin has an intense inflow/outflow regime with complex circulation patterns, involving both fresh Atlantic water and more saline Mediterranean water. Several studies have demonstrated the advantages of the combined use of autonomous underwater vehicles, such as gliders, with remotely sensed products (e.g., altimetry, MUR SST) to observe meso- and submesoscale structures and their properties. An important contribution could come from a new generation of enhanced satellite sea surface salinity (SSS) products, e.g., those provided by the Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity (SMOS) mission. In this paper, we assess the advantages of using Barcelona Expert Center (BEC) SMOS SSS products, obtained through a combination of debiased non-Bayesian retrieval, DINEOF (data interpolating empirical orthogonal functions) and multifractal fusion with high resolution sea surface temperature (OSTIA SST) maps. Such an aim was reached by comparing SMOS Level-3 (L3) and Level-4 (L4) SSS products with in situ high resolution glider measurements collected in the framework of the Algerian Basin Circulation Unmanned Survey (ABACUS) observational program conducted in the Algerian Basin during falls 2014–2016. Results show that different levels of confidence between in situ and satellite measurements can be achieved according to the spatial scales of variability. Although SMOS values slightly underestimate in situ observations (mean difference is −0.14 (−0.11)), with a standard deviation of 0.25 (0.26) for L3 (L4) products), at basin scale, the enhanced SMOS products well represent the salinity patterns described by the ABACUS dataThe ABACUS 1 missions (2014) were supported by the Joint European Research Infrastructure network for Coastal Observatories (JERICO) TransNational Access (TNA) third call (grant agreement no. 262584). The research leading to ABACUS 3 (2016) was supported by the European Union’s H2020 Framework Programme (h2020-INFRAIA-2014-2015) (JERICO-NEXT grant agreement no. 654410). The activities described in this paper were developed in the framework of the Italian Flagship Project RITMARE. This work was supported by the Spanish R+D plan under projects L-BAND (ESP2017-89463-C3-1-R) and PROMISES (ESP2015-67549-C3-2) and from European Space Agency by means of the contracts SMOS ESL L2OS, CCI+SSSPeer Reviewe

Terra Nova Bay Polynya Evolution by MODIS Imagery during Winter 2003 - 2016

Remote sensing is essential for monitoring polynyas dynamics. On regional scales, passive microwave (PM) radiometers provide useful information about their extent. Their coarse resolution often limits an accurate separation of open water from ice cover. Despite their sensitivity to the presence of clouds, thermal infrared (TIR) Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometers (MODIS) provide high resolution information (typically 1 Km) at large swath widths, several times per day. In this study we apply a new methodology that combines a sequence of MODIS swath-based scenes to examine the TNB evolution in the winter season during the last 14 years (2003-2016). Results have been validated through the comparison with a huge set of SAR images acquired by ENVISAT, SENTINEL and COSMO-SkyMed satellites. The good agreement with most of the analyzed SAR images demonstrated the potential of this tool for the continuous monitoring of the polynya extent and the consequent estimation of ice production rates. A comparison with TNB polynya extent estimations retrieved by other MODIS and PM based tools has also been carried out and differences discussed. Furthermore, the polynya events identified through our technique have been compared to the katabatic events captured by the automatic weather stations located along the TNB coast, and their interannual variability analyzed

Terra Nova Bay Polynya Evolution by MODIS Imagery during Winter 2003 - 2016

Remote sensing is essential for monitoring polynyas dynamics. On regional scales, passive microwave (PM) radiometers provide useful information about their extent. Their coarse resolution often limits an accurate separation of open water from ice cover. Despite their sensitivity to the presence of clouds, thermal infrared (TIR) Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometers (MODIS) provide high resolution information (typically 1 Km) at large swath widths, several times per day. In this study we apply a new methodology that combines a sequence of MODIS swath-based scenes to examine the TNB evolution in the winter season during the last 14 years (2003-2016). Results have been validated through the comparison with a huge set of SAR images acquired by ENVISAT, SENTINEL and COSMO-SkyMed satellites. The good agreement with most of the analyzed SAR images demonstrated the potential of this tool for the continuous monitoring of the polynya extent and the consequent estimation of ice production rates. A comparison with TNB polynya extent estimations retrieved by other MODIS and PM based tools has also been carried out and differences discussed. Furthermore, the polynya events identified through our technique have been compared to the katabatic events captured by the automatic weather stations located along the TNB coast, and their interannual variability analyzed

On the use of ABACUS high resolution glider observations for the assessment of phytoplankton ocean biomass from CMEMS model products

Ocean biomass distribution has a growing importance in the world economy as a global strategic reserve, due to environmental and industrial applications and its variability related to climate change. Satellite imagery allows multi-resolution methodologies to obtain estimation, and hopefully classification, of biomass content over sea surface. This information is largely used in numerical simulations and nowadays represents an important contribute to future projections. Nevertheless, satellite, models and classical in situ monitoring resolution/accuracy sometimes cannot provide data at the finer spatial scales needed to describe the complex three-dimensional water column system. On the other hand, glider surveys allow scientists to collect observations of ocean phenomena at very high resolution along the water column, to assess numerical simulations reliability and, eventually, to assimilate these data into ocean models. In this study, we present a quantitative comparison between the glider observations collected in the Algerian Basin (Western Mediterranean Sea) during the ABACUS surveys from 2014 to 2018, and the daily outputs of two co-located CMEMS model products (i.e., GLB and IBI). The achieved results point out that model products are well correlated with glider potential temperature measurements but they still need improvements to provide a correct representation of the chlorophyll concentration variability in the study area. Generally, IBI daily simulations present higher linear correlation with concurrent glider in situ data than GLB ones. IBI products also reproduce better the pattern of the local maxima of chlorophyll concentration across the Algerian Basin. Nevertheless, they largely underestimate glider chlorophyll measurements and present significant differences that limit their capability to reproduce its upper ocean concentration that is needed for accomplishing advanced ecological studies.This work was realized in the framework of the PON R&I 2014–2020 “AIM – Attraction and International Mobility” at Università degli Studi di Napoli Parthenope. Glider missions were performed in the framework of the Algerian BAsin Circulation Unmanned Survey (ABACUS) observational projects. The ABACUS 1 missions (2014) were supported by the Joint European Research Infrastructure network for Coastal Observatories (JERICO) TransNational Access (TNA) third call (grant agreement no. 262584). The ABACUS 2 missions (2015) were realized through the SOCIB glider facility open access programme. The research leading to ABACUS 3 (2016) and ABACUS 4 (2017 and 2018) was supported by the European Union's H2020 Framework Programme (h2020-INFRAIA-2014–2015) (JERICOsingle bondNEXT grant agreement no. 654410).Peer reviewe

Remote sensing of sea surface salinity: A bibliometric analysis

In recent years, rapid advances in technologies have allowed significant positive changes within the field of satellite observations of the global ocean. This paper reviews the available global scientific literature that focuses on the study of salinity by remote sensing, tracking its evolution and trends by combining social network analysis and bibliometrics. Furthermore, the study shows the relationships and co-occurrences between authors, countries and keywords retrieved from the abstracts and citations database provided by Scopus. An analysis of 581 publications has been carried out. The achieved results, which highlight a worldwide increase in scientific interest in this field over the last decade, may constitute a useful tool for a global vision and for a potential improvement in the international efforts employed in the study of salinity from remote sensing