New StoryMap: Monitoring Reef Fish With Advanced Technology and Artificial Intelligence

The Gulf Fishery-Independent Survey of Habitat and Ecosystem Resources, or G-FISHER, is a video-based fishery-independent survey scientists use to monitor reef fish populations in the Gulf of America. This new StoryMap provides a detailed overview of the program and how the team is incorporating advanced technologies. They include multibeam echosounders to map seafloor habitats in high resolution, genomics to process and analyze environmental DNA samples, and artificial intelligence and machine learning to interpret video data.

The StoryMap provides a deep dive into the methods and advanced technology used to collect:

• Detailed maps of the seafloor using multibeam echosounders and side-scan sonars
• Environmental data such as salinity, temperature, depth, and oxygen
• Underwater 360-degree video footage
• Reef fish identification, counts, and measurements
• Accuracy comparisons of human-read versus AI-read video surveys
• Environmental DNA samples to detect cryptic-or hard to observe-species and assess biodiversity

These efforts are greatly increasing the accuracy and efficiency of the fishery-independent data we provide for fisheries assessments.

The survey is a collaborative effort between the Southeast Fisheries Science Center, our state partners at the Florida Fish and Wildlife Research Institute, and NOAA's Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory. It is funded with support from the NOAA RESTORE Science Program .

Check out the StoryMap to learn more about this innovative work.