The California State University (CSU) Center for Integrative Coastal Observation, Research and Education (CICORE) is an applied coastal research center distributed throughout California. CICORE is dedicated to producing nationally relevant solutions to the many challenges facing our marine and estuarine environments while providing research, training and educational opportunities for CSU faculty and students. CICORE utilizes the unique distribution of the CSU campuses to create a coastal ocean observatory along the entire California coastline that focuses on the region from 100 meters deep up to and on to the shore, including estuaries, wetlands, and other critical coastal habitats. CICORE uses three core technologies (high resolution bathymetry, in-situ monitoring, and optical remote sensing) to address economically and environmentally important challenges such as coastal erosion, watershed impacts, chemical contamination of food webs, depletion of marine commercial resources, toxic plankton blooms, marine-borne pathogens, and the rapid invasion of coastal waters by non-indigenous species.
The role of CSUMB in the CICORE inititative is to take the lead in developing a suite of spatial data modeling, image processing and GIS tools that can be used in the fusion of high-resolution seafloor habitat data with hyperspectral sea surface and water column imagery. The CSUMB Seafloor Mapping Lab (SFML) has been acquiring and developing the infrastructure for the delivery of its high-resolution multibeam bathymetry and habitat data to the CICORE partners for site selection baselines, environmental change detection and calibration and depth correction of hyperspectral and other aerial remote sensing data sets.
Data are derived from acoustic remote sensing surveys (high-resolution multibeam bathymetry and sidescan sonar) and are available to CICORE partners and the public via the SFML Data Library (http://seafloor.csumb.edu/SFMLwebDATA.htm). Mapping data have been archived since 2000.
Data sets can also be viewed and accessed through the SFML Internet Map Server (http://seafloor.csumb.edu/arcims.htm).
supported students, ship-time, and dataAssessing tsunami potential in the Monterey submarine canyon (United States Geological Survey) Design and management of Marine Protected Areas (CA Dept of Fish & Game) Identify essential fisheries habitat statewide in support of the California Marine Life Protection Act Initiative (CA Dept of Fish & Game, MLPA) Develop tools for sustainable management of California's squid and rockfish fisheries (CA SeaGrant, National Undersea Research Program) Habitat mapping to facilitate ecosystem-based management at Morro Bay (CA Coastal Conservancy, CA Ocean Protection Council, Central Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board, Packard Foundation) Maintain shipping channels and facilitate beach replenishment at the mouth of San Francisco Bay by providing high-rsolution depth-mapping (USGS, US Army Corps of Engineers) Mapping shipping channels and eelgrass beds in Humboldt Bay and elsewhere in an effort to manage commercially important species (CA Dept of Fish & Game, CA SeaGrant, Humboldt Bay Harbor District) Map coastal wetlands throught the state for conservation and restoration (National Estuarine Research Reserve System, National Estuary Program, NOAA CICEET, Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary SIMoN Program) Monitor coastal erosion statewide (USGS, State Water Resource Control Board) Change detection at the head of Hueneme submarine canyon, Oxnard, California CICORE was established in 2002 to assist the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA),National Science Foundation (NSF), Office of Naval Research (ONR), National Oceanographic Partnership Program (NOPP), and local and regional governments to meet the emerging national mandate for coastal ocean observation. CICORE is an integral part of both the Central and Northern California Ocean Observing System (CeNCOOS) and the Southern California Coastal Ocean Observing System (SCCOOS), which are Regional Associations in the national Integrated Ocean Observing System (IOOS).
