Fwd: Surfers as citizen scientists
Catherine D'Ignazio
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Catherine D'Ignazio
Research Affiliate, MIT Media Lab Center for Civic Media
dign...@mit.edu || @kanarinka || +1 617 501 2441 || www.kanarinka.com || http://civic.mit.edu/blog/kanarinka/
From: Jacopo Durandi <jacopo....@gmail.com>
Date: Wed, Nov 18, 2015 at 11:26 AM
Subject: Surfers as citizen scientists
To: <sensor-j...@googlegroups.com>
Hi all,
I came across this article on the potential of surfers as citizen scientists, "On the potential of surfers to monitor environmental indicators in the coastal zone":
http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0127706
It seemed interesting enough to share. Below the abstract.
Cheers,
Jacopo
The social and economic benefits of the coastal zone make it one of the most treasured environments on our planet. Yet it is vulnerable to increasing anthropogenic pressure and climate change. Coastal management aims to mitigate these pressures while augmenting the socio-economic benefits the coastal region has to offer. However, coastal management is challenged by inadequate sampling of key environmental indicators, partly due to issues relating to cost of data collection. Here, we investigate the use of recreational surfers as platforms to improve sampling coverage of environmental indicators in the coastal zone. We equipped a recreational surfer, based in the south west United Kingdom (UK), with a temperature sensor and Global Positioning System (GPS) device that they used when surfing for a period of one year (85 surfing sessions). The temperature sensor was used to derive estimates of sea-surface temperature (SST), an important environmental indicator, and the GPS device used to provide sample location and to extract information on surfer performance. SST data acquired by the surfer were compared with data from an oceanographic station in the south west UK and with satellite observations. Our results demonstrate: (i) high-quality SST data can be acquired by surfers using low cost sensors; and (ii) GPS data can provide information on surfing performance that may help motivate data collection by surfers. Using recent estimates of the UK surfing population, and frequency of surfer participation, we speculate around 40 million measurements on environmental indicators per year could be acquired at the UK coastline by surfers. This quantity of data is likely to enhance coastal monitoring and aid UK coastal management. Considering surfing is a world-wide sport, our results have global implications and the approach could be expanded to other popular marine recreational activities for coastal monitoring of environmental indicators.
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Mathew Lippincott
Surf Rider is involved in coastal advocacy and beginning to get their feet wet in citizen science:
http://www.surfrider.org/
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