Marine scientists have formed a data repository for information about marine life around the world called OBIS (Ocean Biogeographic Information System). In order to help people better visualize the data, scientists from Duke University have created the OBIS SeaMap which lets you visualize the geospatial marine life data on maps – including Google Earth. It lets you explore the interactive online archives for marine mammals, sea turtles and seabirds data.
Visit the SeaMap site and you can either start by viewing species on the main map page, or you can select a dataset or species. Don’t worry, they recognize both common names as well as scientific names for each specie. For Google Earth they provide a link 
for mapping all the species in one file – you can open folders and turn on the different categories within GE. Or you can go to a specific specie and map their common habitat areas. For example, go to the species map, and enter “Blue Whale”, then select the Google Earth link. Once the link loads in GE, you can zoom to different parts of the Earth and it will then load the data from their server showing the density of population of habitat for that view.
This is the kind of data I hope will be available when/if Google Ocean becomes available. Maybe this data was developed with that plan in mind.
Collection spotted via AnyGeo
google ocean
Links: Bioneers, Science Apps, Ogle Catchup, Google Ocean, GreenPeace, Geocoding
-
Bioneers – The Google Earth Outreach team attended the Bioneers Conference (a conference of non-profit and public benefit groups) in San Rafael, California. They recruited many Outreach members to share their story of success in using Google earth to spread their word about their causes. Read more about their experience in this series of blog posts: one, two, and three. And, here’s another summary of the Google Earth presentations from TreeHugger.
-
Science Apps – The Scientific Applicatioons with Google Earth Conference was held this week at the University of Michigan. I wish I could have attended as it appears several folks I know from AGU conferences were there presenting. Here is a summary of day 1 by ‘HayleyM”. I haven’t seen any other blog postings. If anyone runs across some, let me know.
-
Ogle Catchup – Stefan Geens says he’s been really busy the last few months, and this is why his blog postings have dropped off at OgleEarth. Yesterday he posted a giant-sized catch up post with lots of interesting links.
-
Google Ocean – Last April, a CNET article revealed rumors that Google was working on “Google Ocean” – the by either adding new capabilities to Google Earth to enable it to share ocean data (3D bathymetry and more), or maybe a separate applications. I’ve heard from many oceanographers that the rumors are true. There are some interesting Google Earth ocean-related KML files listed in this blog post at Discovery Channel, and for a long time Peio Essilades at Magic Instinct has been sharing Ocean related data for Google Earth. There are some great KML files here, so check it out if you have interest in the oceans. He’s even been calling his site “Google Ocean” since 2006 (before the rumors). Links via OgleEarth.
-
GreenPeace – Got an E-mail from James Woolley who is on a GreenPeace ship touring Indonesia to raise awareness about environmental issues – particularly forest logging – there. Noel Jenkins at Digital Geography also got the E-mail and has posted the whole thing along with photos. You can view the GE KML file
from GreenPeace which shows their ship’s journey around Indonesia with placemarks and links back to their blog posts. -
Reverse GeoCoding – Google Maps has had an API for sometime allowing you to Geocode – turn addresses into coordinates. Now, Google has released reverse-geocoding (see Pamela Fox’s announcement post). This allows you to give coordinates, and Google gives you the nearest address to those coordinates. This opens up lots of possible applications. Mapperz sent me an E-mail about his post on this first. GoogleMapsMania has an excellent summary post of what this means along with nice links to sample applications from Google. My favorite is the Reverse Geocoding Game. I’d like to see this reverse geocoding work inside Google Earth – I’m sure someone could put together a network link to make it work, but it would be even better if there was a function built-in somehow.
Rumor-mill: Google Ocean in the Works
According to CNET, Google is working on a new product rumored to be called “Google Ocean“. Apparently Google invited a bunch of oceanography experts last December to discuss creating a 3D oceanographic map. And now, rumors are flying on what might result.
Ever since Google Earth was released in 2005, many people have wondered why the ocean floors seen in relief color were not in 3D. According to posts by some of its developers, part of the reason had to do the 3D model of GE not allowing sub-surface rendering. There have been rumors for a long time Google was planning to add 3D to the oceans and allow sub-surface rendering for Google Earth. So, would this new ocean-viewing capibility mean another new version of Google Earth? Google Earth 4.3 was just released two weeks ago – it seems unlikely we’d see something else new right away. Or is the capability to render ocean floors already built in to 4.3 and they just need to turn on new servers to make the oceans 3D? Or, will we have to wait several months before Google Ocean is released?
There are three approaches to making Google Ocean. First, as suggested above: modifying Google Earth’s base terrain model to support ocean floor 3D data. This would be the best approach in my opinion. Keep it all in one application. Second, Google Ocean could be a different dataset like Google Sky where you switch to a different mode – connecting to a different server – still using the Google Earth application. Or, third, Google Ocean could be a whole new application. Hmm….
Google Earth’s capability to overlay images and placemark data has already enabled oceanographers and other scientists to add many useful layers of information about our world’s oceans. Here are just a few examples of useful marine visualizations for Google Earth:
- Sea Surface Temperature
- Coral Reef Base – a database on the condition of the world’s reefs
- Ocean Weather Data Gulf and Western Atlantic
- US Nautical Charts in Google Earth – EarthNC has a ton of Google Earth content for boaters
- Scientific Ocean Drilling Database
- California Marine Protected Areas
- Cruise Ship Positions and Web Cams
Scientific Ocean Drilling Database in Google Earth
The Integrated Ocean Drilling Program (IODP) is an international scientific research program dedicated to advancing scientific understanding of the Earth by monitoring and sampling subseafloor environments. Through multiple ocean going ship platforms, IODP scientists explore the deep biosphere, environmental change, geodynamics and solid earth cycles. They have created an excellent Google Earth visualization showing the location of drilling of scientific boreholes in oceans all over the world (info here). Each placemark is color-coded according to the different programs, and the placemark descriptions basic metadata about each borehole, links to database information on their servers, and links to scientific publications related to the respective project. This is an excellent example of sharing scientific data in a meaningful way using the power of Google Earth’s visualization capabilities, ability to link back to databases for further information, and the network link to keep information up to date. Apparently this is their second version of this file, I don’t believe I saw the first version. via Dulce’s Spanish GE Blog.
Tracking a Whale Shark in the Indian Ocean
A team of students from the German Europen School Singapore GPS tagged a whale shark in August. They are using Google Earth to show the track of this gentle 7 meter long creature which they named “Schroeder”. Whale Sharks are more whale than shark by most common perceptions. Their primary food is plankton which is why they have very large mouths so they can swim and capture large quantities of these small bits of food.
Download Schroeder’s track . You can see from the track that Schroeder has moved about 700 KM in the last month from the Seychelles (where they tagged him) towards the continent of Africa. This is an interesting application of Google Earth to visualize the track of a wild animal through the oceans. I expect other marine scientists who are tracking whales, turtles, dolphins, and many other sea creatures will begin to follow this excellent example for using our favorite tool. The students have created an english version of their site which you can find here. Their post at the GE Community can be found here.
By the way, I found a link on their web site to a story that Whale Sharks are getting smaller due to overfishing. Definitely worth a read since overfishing is a serious concern affecting sea life around the world.