Measuring growth of shape in stony corals
Robert Bourke
rbourke at OCEANIT.COM
Fri Jun 1 14:37:04 EDT 2001
Les;
I don't know of anyone who has used this approach, but it would seem
that the application of fractal dimensional analyses would be quite
appropriate; looking at changes in absolute size and dimensional state as
the coral grows. Rugosity has often been a measure of complexity on a reef,
but it is typically measured with 19th century technology - draping a chain
of known link size over the substrate & then taking the ratio of (straight
line distance between the ends of the chain : absolute length of chain).
I'm thinking that one could develop a laser scanner that could make this
measurement in-situ with much greater accuracy over a range of scales. I've
got a preliminary design of such a device but haven't been able to obtain
funding (or time) to actually develop it.
Good luck!
Bob Bourke
Oceanit, Hawaii
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Les Kaufman [SMTP:lesk at bu.edu]
> Sent: Sunday, May 27, 2001 5:00 AM
> Cc: coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
> Subject: Measuring growth of shape in stony corals
>
> Many of us face the problem of quantifying changes in both size and
> shape of corals as they grow. What computational approaches are folks
> currently using for the latter, the measuring of changes in colony form,
> for ramose/branching species like finger and staghorn corals?
>
> --
> Les Kaufman
> Biology Department
> Boston University
> 5 Cummington St.
> Boston, MA 02215
> lesk at bu.edu
> 617-353-5560 office
> 617-353-6965 lab
> 617-353-6340 fax
>
> and
>
> BUMP
> 7 MBL St.
> Woods Hole, MA 02543
> 508-289-7579 office
> 508-289-7950 fax
>
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