A team from the IOI-Malta Operational Centre, made up of Alan Deidun, Aldo Drago, Adam Gauci, Joel Azzopardi and Anthony Galea, recently conducted a research project in which they statistically compared ocean colour values from satellites with in situ values collected in the field. Ocean colour can be used to gauge the productivity of a marine area since it is the measure of suspended chlor-ophyll pigment as gleaned from space. Chlorophyll, in turn, is a pigment found in microscopic plants known as phytoplankton (which are the basis of marine food webs) which is used by such organisms to harvest sunlight to make sugars in a process known as photosynthesis. Read More
