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A new Coastal Rapid Environmental Assessment (CREA) strategy has been developed and successfully applied to the Northern Adriatic Sea. CREA strategy exploits the recent advent of operational oceanography to establish a CREA system based on an operational regional forecasting system and coastal monitoring networks of opportunity. The methodology wishes to initialize a coastal high resolution model, nested within the regional forecasting system, blending the large scale parent model fields with the available coastal observations to generate the requisite field estimates. CREA modeling system consists of a high resolution, O(800m), Adriatic SHELF model (ASHELF) implemented into the Northern Adriatic basin and nested within the Adriatic Forecasting System (AFS) (Oddo et al. 2006). The observational system is composed by the coastal networks established in the framework of ADRICOSM (ADRiatic sea integrated COastal areaS and river basin Managment system) Pilot Project. An assimilation technique exerts a correction of the initial field provided by AFS on the basis of the available observations. The blending of the two data sets has been carried out through a multi-scale optimal interpolation technique developed by Mariano and Brown (1992). Two CREA weekly exercises have been conducted: the first, at the beginning of May (spring experiment); the second in middle August (summer experiment). The weeks have been chosen looking at the availability of all coastal observations in the initialization day and one week later to validate model results, verifying our predictive skills. ASHELF spin up time has been investigated too, through a dedicated experiment, in order to obtain the maximum forecast accuracy within a minimum time. Energetic evaluations show that for the Northern Adriatic Sea and for the forcing applied, a spin-up period of one week allows ASHELF to generate new circulation features enabled by the increased resolution and its total kinetic energy to establish a new dynamical balance. CREA results, evaluated by mean of standard statistics between ASHELF and coastal CTDs, show improvement deriving from the initialization technique and a good model performance in the coastal areas of the Northern Adriatic basin, characterized by a shallow and wide continental shelf subject to substantial freshwater influence from rivers. Results demonstrate the feasibility of our CREA strategy to support coastal zone management and wish an additional establishment of operational coastal monitoring activities to advance it.

Satellite remote sensing has proved to be an effective support in timely detection and monitoring of marine oil pollution, mainly due to illegal ship discharges. In this context, we have developed a new methodology and technique for optical oil spill detection, which make use of MODIS L2 and MERIS L1B satellite top of atmosphere (TOA) reflectance imagery, for the first time in a highly automated way. The main idea was combining wide swaths and short revisit times of optical sensors with SAR observations, generally used in oil spill monitoring. This arises from the necessity to overcome the SAR reduced coverage and long revisit time of the monitoring area. This can be done now, given the MODIS and MERIS higher spatial resolution with respect to older sensors (250-300 m vs. 1 km), which consents the identification of smaller spills deriving from illicit discharge at sea. The procedure to obtain identifiable spills in optical reflectance images involves removal of oceanic and atmospheric natural variability, in order to enhance oil-water contrast; image clustering, which purpose is to segment the oil spill eventually presents in the image; finally, the application of a set of criteria for the elimination of those features which look like spills (look-alikes). The final result is a classification of oil spill candidate regions by means of a score based on the above criteria. / Oil Spill Detection, MODIS, MERIS, Destriping, Clustering, Feature extraction; Classification

The study of the impact of climate change on the environment has been based, until very recently, on an global approach, whose interest from a local point of view is very limited. This thesis, on the contrary, has treated the study of the impact of climate change in the Adriatic Sea basin following a twofold strategy of regionalization and integration of numerical models in order to reproduce the present and future scenarios of the system through a more and more realistic and solid approach. In particular the focus of the study was on the impact on the physical environment and on the sediment transport in the basin. This latter is a very new and original issue, to our knowledge still uninvestigated. The study case of the coastal area of Montenegro was particularly studied, since it is characterized by an important supply of sediment through the Buna/Bojana river, second most important in the Adriatic basin in terms of flow. To do this, a methodology to introduce the tidal processes in a baroclinic primitive equations Ocean General Circulation Model was applied and tidal processes were successfully reproduced in the Adriatic Sea, analyzing also the impacts they have on the mean general circulation, on salt and heat transport and on mixing and stratification of the water column in the different seasons of the year. The new hydrodynamical model has been further coupled with a wave model and with a river and sea sediment transport model, showing good results in the reproduction of sediment transport processes. Finally this complex coupled platform was integrated in the period 2001-2030 under the A1B scenario of IPCC, and the impact of climate change on the physical system and on sediment transport was preliminarily evaluated.

Sea-level variability is characterized by multiple interacting factors described in the Fourth Assessment Report (Bindoff et al., 2007) of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) that act over wide spectra of temporal and spatial scales. In Church et al. (2010) sea-level variability and changes are defined as manifestations of climate variability and change. The European Environmental Agency (EEA) defines sea level as one of most important indicators for monitoring climate change, as it integrates the response of different components of the Earths system and is also affected by anthropogenic contributions (EEA, 2011). The balance between the different sea-level contributions represents an important source of uncertainty, involving stochastic processes that are very difficult to describe and understand in detail, to the point that they are defined as an enigma in Munk (2002). Sea-level rate estimates are affected by all these uncertainties, in particular if we look at possible responses to sea-level contributions to future climate. At the regional scale, lateral fluxes also contribute to sea-level variability, adding complexity to sea-level dynamics. The research strategy adopted in this work to approach such an interesting and challenging topic has been to develop an objective methodology to study sea-level variability at different temporal and spatial scales, applicable in each part of the Mediterranean basin in particular, and in the global ocean in general, using all the best calibrated sources of data (for the Mediterranean): in-situ, remote-sensig and numerical models data. The global objective of this work was to achieve a deep understanding of all of the components of the sea-level signal contributing to sea-level variability, tendency and trend and to quantify them.

The thesis objectives are to develop new methodologies for study of the space and time variability of Italian upper ocean ecosystem through the combined use of multi-sensors satellite data and in situ observations and to identify the capability and limits of remote sensing observations to monitor the marine state at short and long time scales. Three oceanographic basins have been selected and subjected to different types of analyses. The first region is the Tyrrhenian Sea where a comparative analysis of altimetry and lagrangian measurements was carried out to study the surface circulation. The results allowed to deepen the knowledge of the Tyrrhenian Sea surface dynamics and its variability and to defined the limitations of satellite altimetry measurements to detect small scale marine circulation features. Channel of Sicily study aimed to identify the spatial-temporal variability of phytoplankton biomass and to understand the impact of the upper ocean circulation on the marine ecosystem. An combined analysis of the satellite of long term time series of chlorophyll, Sea Surface Temperature and Sea Level field data was applied. The results allowed to identify the key role of the Atlantic water inflow in modulating the seasonal variability of the phytoplankton biomass in the region. Finally, Italian coastal marine system was studied with the objective to explore the potential capability of Ocean Color data in detecting chlorophyll trend in coastal areas. The most appropriated methodology to detect long term environmental changes was defined through intercomparison of chlorophyll trends detected by in situ and satellite. Then, Italian coastal areas subject to eutrophication problems were identified. This work has demonstrated that satellites data constitute an unique opportunity to define the features and forcing influencing the upper ocean ecosystems dynamics and can be used also to monitor environmental variables capable of influencing phytoplankton productivity. / L'obiettivo di questa tesi è lo studio della variabilità spazio temporale dei parametri chiave (temperatura, clorofilla e correnti) che descrivono lo stato dell'ecosistema marino dei mari Italiani attraverso un uso integrato di dati satellitari multi sensore e osservazioni in situ. Diversi tipologie di approcci e differenti dataset sono stati utilizzati per studiare la circolazione marina, l'impatto dei forzanti fisici sulla variabilità della biomassa fitoplantonica, e per definire una possibile metodologia di utilizzo di dati satellitari per lo studio della qualità delle acque. Sono stati scelti tre sottobacini dei Mari italiani su cui effettuare differenti tipologie di analisi. L'analisi comparata di misure altimetriche e dati lagrangiani condotta nel Mar Tirreno ha permesso di ridisegnare la circolazione del bacino e di dimostrare la presenza di ricolazioni semipermantenti e di strutture transienti che dominano la dinamica di questo mare. Inoltre è stata evidenziata l'importanza dell'uso congiunto di dati altimetrici e lagrangiani per l'identificazioni di strutture della circolazione di piccola scala. Nel Canale di Sicilia sono state invece analizzate lunghe serie temporali di clorofilla, di temperatura superficiale del mare e livello del mare utilizzando tecniche statistiche avanzate. Lo studio ha permesso identificare la variabilità spazio-temporale del fitoplancton e di comprendere l'impatto della circolazione marina sull’ecosistema costiero siciliano. Infine sull’intero sistema marino costiero Italiano è stata sviluppata una procedura per la definizione di trend di clorofilla da dati di Ocean Color. Diversi metodi per la stima del trend sono stati testati sia su serie temporali di dati OC che su serie temporali di misure in situ di clorofilla effettuate dalle Agenzie Regionali per la Protezione ambientale. Il confronto tra le stime ottenute ha permesso di individuare il metodo che meglio si adatta ai dati satellitari. Tale metodo è stato poi applicato per identificare le aree costiere Italiane soggette ad eutrofizzazione.

The most ocean - atmosphere exchanges take place in polar environments due to the low temperatures which favor the absorption processes of atmospheric gases, in particular CO2. For this reason, the alterations of biogeochemical cycles in these areas can have a strong impact on the global climate. With the aim of contributing to the definition of the mechanisms regulating the biogeochemical fluxes we have analyzed the particles collected in the Ross Sea in different years (ROSSMIZE, BIOSESO 1 and 2, ROAVERRS and ABIOCLEAR projects) in two sites (mooring A and B). So it has been developed a more efficient method to prepare sediment trap samples for the analyses. We have also processed satellite data of sea ice, chlorophyll a and diatoms concentration. At both sites, in each year considered, there was a high seasonal and inter-annual variability of biogeochemical fluxes closely correlated with sea ice cover and primary productivity. The comparison between the samples collected at mooring A and B in 2008 highlighted the main differences between these two sites. Particle fluxes at Mooring A, located in a polynia area, are higher than mooring B ones and they happen about a month before. In the mooring B area it has been possible to correlate the particles fluxes to the ice concentration anomalies and with the atmospheric changes in response to El Niño Southern Oscillations. In 1996 and 1999, years subjected to La Niña, the concentrations of sea ice in this area have been less than in 1998, year subjected to El Niño. Inverse correlation was found for 2005 and 2008. In the mooring A area significant differences in mass and biogenic fluxes during 2005 and 2008 has been recorded. This allowed to underline the high variability of lateral advection processes and to connect them to the physical forcing. / Gli ambienti polari rappresentano il luogo in cui avvengono i maggiori scambi tra atmosfera e oceano grazie alle basse temperature che favoriscono i processi di assorbimento dei gas atmosferici, in particolare di CO2. Le alterazioni dei cicli biogeochimici di queste regioni quindi possono avere un forte impatto sul clima globale. Ci si è proposti di contribuire alla definizione dei meccanismi che regolano attualmente i flussi biogeochimici nel Mare di Ross analizzando il particellato raccolto in vari anni (progetti ROSSMIZE, BIOSESO 1 e 2, ROAVERRS e ABIOCLEAR) in due siti fissi (mooring A e B). A tal fine è stato messo a punto un metodo di preparazione dei campioni di trappola più efficiente e sono stati elaborati i dati da satellite relativi alla concentrazione dei ghiacci, di clorofilla a e di diatomee. In ognuno degli anni esaminati, in entrambi i siti, si è osservata un’alta variabilità stagionale e interannuale dei flussi biogeochimici strettamente correlata alla copertura di ghiaccio e alla produttività primaria. Il confronto tra i campioni del 2008 raccolti dai mooring A e B ha evidenziato le principali differenze tra i due siti: nel mooring A, situato nell’area di polynia, flussi più alti e anticipati di circa un mese rispetto al mooring B. Nella zona del mooring B i flussi di particelle sono stati correlati alle fluttuazioni dei ghiacci e alle variazioni atmosferiche dovute a El Niño Southern Oscillation. Nel 1996 e 1999, anni soggetti a La Niña, le concentrazioni dei ghiacci sono state minori mentre nel 1998, periodo soggetto a El Niño, maggiori. Correlazione inversa è stata riscontrata per il 2005 e il 2008. Nell’area del mooring A le consistenti differenze registrate nei flussi relativi al 2005 e 2008, hanno consentito di evidenziare l’alta variabilità dei fenomeni di avvezione laterale e di collegarli al forcing fisico.

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Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 1975. / Typescript. Vita. eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 130-137).