Project
HOTPIXELS: Using satellite-derived water color data to test whether lakemounts are biological hotspots
Oceanic seamounts are highly productive systems in oligotrophic regions of the open ocean, which support high biomass, diversity, and ecosystem services (e.g., carbon sequestration, fish production). Their abrupt topography modifies water circulation, generates upwelling of nutrient-rich waters to the photic zone, and fuels primary productivity that propagates up and through the food web. In large lakes, lakemounts are expected to play a similar role. Limited evidence suggests lakemounts support high biomass and diversity of native fishes in the Laurentian Great Lakes and Lake Champlain. However, we know very little about the processes that may drive these patterns and whether such patterns are ubiquitous across large lake systems. Satellite-derived surface water color data provide a low-cost opportunity to evaluate whether this idea has merit – We hypothesize that water on and around lakemounts will exhibit a shift toward greener water color (i.e., longer dominant wavelength values) compared to adjacent offshore regions, consistent with higher chlorophyll-a concentrations and enhanced primary productivity. We propose to test our hypothesis on several Lake Superior lakemounts as a pilot study using surface water color data derived from satellite images. If supported, our approach can be applied to test a wider range of lakes with distinct environmental conditions and lakemount morphologies. We expect our findings to provide evidence that lakemounts can fuel primary productivity in offshore regions of large lake systems and provide a basis for biological hotspots that support diverse food web communities.