New research using customized BlueROV2 to conduct kelp forest surveys

Thanks for reaching out, @in2thesea! I’ll send you a DM - let’s set up some time to talk.

There’s a few points to touch on regarding ROV-related education in nearshore systems. We’ve developed a few small activities for youth to do, e.g., viewing real-world ROV surveys and “hunting” (visually searching) for species such as crabs, sea stars, etc.

There are other excellent resources out there, such as Zooniverse, a citizen science initiative where the public can interact with imagery and help reserachers extract data (often, e.g., to help train AI models). For example, check out Click-a-Coral, where people can help identify species from deep sea coral reef surveys.

We are thinking about starting our own Zooniverse project, and as the Seattle Aquarium has a large education / outreach mission, I may push to host a variety of ROV / kelp forest educational content there as well. I envision a hub where students learn about ecological patterns, processes, and mechanisms via, e.g., blog posts, and then also learn about specific species via tutorials, and via searching through and interacting with real-world imagery, all in a way that generates meaningful data for researchers.

Otherwise, in terms of ROV-related educational resources, take a look at the attached pdf :slight_smile:

Ocean Technology Resource List for Educators.pdf (593.2 KB)

Cheers!
Zach

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