Bio-Optical Characteristics of Coastal Marine Systems

The bio-optical characteristics of coastal marine systems arise from the interplay between sunlight and the constituent materials within the water column. In these nearshore environments, light attenuation and scattering are governed by dissolved organic matter, suspended particulate matter and phytoplankton pigments, each with distinct absorption and scattering spectra. Coloured dissolved organic matter (CDOM) often dominates light absorption in estuarine and shelf waters, while inorganic particles and non-algal detritus contribute to spectral scattering. Phytoplankton pigments, especially chlorophyll a, impart additional variability that reflects community composition and physiological state. The complex mixture of these constituents renders coastal waters optically heterogeneous, challenging standard ocean-colour algorithms devised for open ocean conditions. Understanding these bio-optical properties is crucial for accurate retrieval of chlorophyll concentrations, primary production estimates and carbon fluxes, with direct implications for ecosystem management, fisheries sustainability and assessment of land-sea biogeochemical exchanges under changing climatic and anthropogenic pressures.

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Bio-Optical Characteristics of Coastal Marine Systems publication trend

The graph below shows the total number of articles in bio-optical characteristics of coastal marine systems across all publications each year (not limited to Nature Index journals).

Technical terms

Bio-optical properties: The absorption, scattering and attenuation characteristics of water influenced by its dissolved and particulate constituents.

Chlorophyll a (Chl a): A primary photosynthetic pigment in phytoplankton used as an indicator of biomass and productivity.

Coloured dissolved organic matter (CDOM): Organic molecules that absorb light strongly in the ultraviolet and blue regions, affecting water transparency.

Inherent optical properties (IOPs): Quantitative measures of absorption and scattering by water and its constituents, independent of the ambient light field.

Remote sensing reflectance (Rrs): The ratio of water-leaving radiance to downwelling irradiance, used in satellite ocean-colour retrievals of water constituents.

References

1. Performance of Algorithms for Retrieving Chlorophyll a Concentrations in the Arctic Ocean: Impact on Primary Production Estimates. Remote Sensing (2024).
2. High colored dissolved organic matter (CDOM) absorption in surface waters of the central-eastern Arctic Ocean: Implications for biogeochemistry and ocean color algorithms. PLOS ONE (2018).
3. Light Absorption by Phytoplankton in the Upper Mixed Layer of the Black Sea: Seasonality and Parametrization. Frontiers in Marine Science (2017).
4. Parameterization of the light absorption properties of chromophoric dissolved organic matter in the Baltic Sea and Pomeranian lakes. Ocean Science (2016).