Dye tracing and concentration mapping in coastal waters using unmanned aerial vehicles.

ABSTRACT: Coastal water flows facilitate important nutrient exchanges between mangroves, seagrasses and coral reefs. However, due to the complex nature of tidal interactions, their spatiotemporal development can be difficult to trace via traditional field instrumentations. Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) serve as ideal platforms from which to capture such dynamic responses. Here, we provide a UAV-based approach for tracing coastal water flows using object-based detection of dye plume extent coupled with a regression approach for mapping dye concentration. From hovering UAV images and nine subsequent flight surveys covering the duration of an ebbing tide in the Red Sea, our results show that dye plume extent can be mapped with low omission and commission errors when assessed against manual delineatio

SUBMITTER: Johansen K 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8783014 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature