Tropical Marine Sciences and Grids(?)

1. Tropical Marine Sciences and Grids(?) Ian Atkinson(JCU), Scott Bainbridge & Stuart Kininmonth (AIMS) AIMS@JCU Ian.Atkinson@jcu.edu.au S.Bainbridge@aims.gov.au S.Kininmonth@aims.gov.auhttp://www.jcu.edu.au/hpc http://www.aims.gov.au/adc http://www.qpsf.edu.au

2. AIMS • Australian Government Marine Research Agency; • Around 200 staff in Townsville, Darwin and Perth; • Established in 1973, operated initially in the Great Barrier Reef but now internationally; • Focus on tropical marine systems: • Coral reefs and fishes • Mangroves and near-shore systems • Bio-tech / bio prospecting / drug discovery • Oceanography / remote sensing

3. The Challenge of the Tropics • Most of worlds population are contained within Tropical regions; fastest growing populations • Climate change has greatest impact • E.g. C4 plants under threat with increased [CO2] • Impact of storms and droughts • Few of the worlds tropical cities are in developing regions • Resource constrained • Source of Greatest Biodiversity! • Going to undergo huge change in coming decades • Vulnerable, massive geopolitical challenges are growing • We need new ideas and models…

4. Coral Reefs… • Globally these systems are in crisis • The Great Barrier Reef (GBR) is one of the best managed • GBR consists of 3500 reefs along 2500 Km coast line; • Globally 20% of reefs have been destroyed, another 24% are immediately threatened, a further 26 are also threatened; • Main impacts are global warming (via coral bleaching and storm damage), un-sustainable use and changes in coastal use patterns (river run-off, land based pollution, etc). Complete collapse of regionally critical fisheries is now common place…

5. Coral Bleaching… ??? http://www.reeffutures.org.au

6. Policy Questions: Effect of agricultural runoffs… Agriculture

7. Rate of adaptation… • Our change of traditional usage patterns is slow (e.g. continuing to fish unviable systems) • Regulatory agencies seems slow respond • Public opinion is often slower… • The result is crisis management • We NEED • Better tools, data and accessibility • To move from a reactive to a pre-emptive mode of management. This will be a decades long journey.

8. OAIS OAIS Towards better data, tools, understanding … and actions

9. Opportunities • Dramatically change our levels of understanding; • Integration between systems and data sources • Met systems, navigation systems, security monitoring, true ocean observing systems, tourist systems, etc.; • Play a small part in understanding of large scale systems and how these are changing (global warming, etc).

10. AIMS Weather Stations • 10 reef or island based weather stations • Half hourly recordings of ambient environmental conditions • Water temperature • Use HF Radio / CDMA / GSM communications • Data stored at AIMS and made available via the web http://www.aims.gov.au/weather.shtml

11. Where we are now… Ningaloo Reefs Agincourt Reef Orpheus Island Myrmidon Reef Cleveland Bay Davies Reef Cape Bowling Green Hardy Reef Half-tide Rocks

12. Met Bureau Sites

13. “Up she goes…”

14. Scales of Reef Science • Individual Coral (µm, mm, cm) • growth rates, coral structures • Coral Bommie (m) • Mix of species, temperature / nutrient gradients etc. • Reef (km) • Inter Reef & Lagoon (10-100’s km) • Currents, river plumes, larval migration • Global

15. Light • Temperature • 2-axis acceleration • Movement • 30-100 M range http://www.teco.uni-karlsruhe.de Sensor Nets • Designed to meet the specific experiments or tasks • Unique experimental platforms - measurements at different time and spatial scales • Different data (and metadata) formats / management • Highly specialized and customized • Lack of well documented and generalized abstractions Price: 30 Euro Pragma to fix?!!

16. Sensors on the GBR: Demand? • ‘Ideal’ environment to showcase Sensor Network & E-Research applications • Vast, Massively coupled, Huge quantity of historic data • But many complex data synthesis and ‘visualisation’ challenges • Long Term Project & Goals • Need data (historic and real time) • Integration, Modeling • Science and Policy outcomes • Satellite Remote Sensing • Very valuable, Clouds… Larry Movie from Rob Newman, SIO: http://eqinfo.ucsd.edu/~rnewman/

17. Sensor Net: Problems • Highly Regulated: • GBRMPA, Slow deployment • Deployment is hard and expensive • Communications Issues • Vast distances, unreliable, variable rates • Power and Sensor Issues • Need redundancy, local intelligence • Two - way communications - intelligence in middleware (sensors power budget) • Video & image analysis critical.

18. Power • Solar Cells: • Remote Platform + Sea Gulls =Guano + No power • Alternatives: • Fuel Cells (MeOH - approval) • Wind (Sea Gull approval pending); only large platforms

19. Microwave Humidity Ducting(or how I learned to love heat & humidity) Rx Level (dB) G Woods, S Kininmonth & I Atkinson, JCU

20. Costal Radars (CODAR) • HF ocean surface radar to monitor surface currents, wind directions and wave heights • Capricorn and Bunker Group of reefs and islands in the southern part of the GBR • 100 x100 km, 3km pixel • April 2006 deployment Mal Heron, JCU

23. Wayne Mallett, HPC Toolboxes (APAC supported) Multi-Matlab (APAC Supported)

24. Failing Neutrality? • ‘neutral theory of biodiversity’ is the basis of all Marine Parks. • Concept is shown to be untrue for corals • location and environmental change play a critical role in determining what sorts of corals settle and flourish

25. Uptake of Web Enabled Codes at JCU

26. IT & Data & Biology- Remote Toxin Monitoring CDMA Broadband Modem OQO Windows XP Ultra Running Java Programs USB Field Microscope Laboratory Analysis, results by e-mail within an hour Oyster or other shellfish

27. Where we need to be… • Real-time “smart” sensor network over the GBR linked into adaptive models and feeding into visual GIS Environmental Monitoring Information Systems. • We have some progress: • “humidity ducted” microwave; • Long term power via Solar, and wind to large towers • Reef Structures in place • Testing Ambient Systems motes • To there is so much more • Further developing & deploying the • Middleware including meta-data standards, data discovery, exploration and exchange; • Setting and using standard methods to ensure inter-operability; • …

29. The Platform • Remote reef based structures; • Flexible, standard design; • Solar / wind / fuel cell power options; • 20 year design life; • Up to twice yearly service trips if required; • HF Radio and potentially CDMA / GSM / microwave communications; • Environmentally friendly;

30. Challenges • Marine fouling, servicing and maintenance (the problem of cyclones!) • Marine communication – reliability in an unpredictable world • Data Volumes and processing (waving not drowning) • Extracting the knowledge – what does it all mean? • Making it useful – the ‘so what’ factor • Making it essential – integrating the data and systems and processes into the management, regulatory and science frameworks.

31. Opportunities • Dramatically change our levels of understanding; • Integration with other systems – Met systems, navigation system, security monitoring, true ocean observing systems, tourist systems, etc.; • Play a small part in understanding of large scale systems and how these are changing (global warming, etc).

32. Root cause is identified as Air Conditioning failure with resulting overheating of DWDM line card. • Replacement DWDM line card cleared down alarms, but was causing signal degrade alarms at Tarong. • After analysing fault, it was suspected that the new card was faulty. • Original card was re-installed again OK • Air conditioner unit had failed due to ant infestation. • Air conditioner to be repaired first thing tomorrow…