Expanding renewable energy is integral to addressing the climate crisis. For example, MBARI’s innovative technology—including the versatile LRAUV, which can be equipped with various instruments to study ocean health—informs how routine monitoring of offshore wind energy sites can be conducted without crewed vessels.

Denmark’s Jutland Peninsula has 13 wind farms, with five more planned for construction. The Danish government uses ship-based surveys to monitor the impact of installing hundreds of wind turbines in shallow waters across this region. Ship-based sampling is expensive and requires substantial resources. Resource managers are increasingly looking to autonomous systems to conduct these biological surveys and grow their capacity to monitor ocean environments in space and time. 

MBARI’s LRAUV is a nimble robot that can travel to remote areas of the ocean for extended periods. Outfitting the LRAUV with the 3G ESP allows resource managers to tap into the potential for eDNA to expand ocean health monitoring. The 3G-ESP LRAUV collects and preserves samples indicative of the biological community. Cartridges mounted in a rotating carousel inside the instrument gather up to 60 water samples during a single deployment. In the lab, in-depth sequencing detects the DNA “fingerprints” in the samples to identify which organisms may have been present. By deploying multiple vehicles, researchers can take a snapshot of ocean health over a large area. Repeated surveys can reveal changes in the community over time.

With funding from the Velux Foundation and the Independent Research Fund Denmark, MBARI partnered with researchers from the Danish Technical University (DTU) to deploy a pair of 3G-ESP LRAUVs in June 2024 to survey the biological community around a wind farm. 

Each vehicle surveyed around the same wind farm—one inside and one outside of the farm—gathering approximately 120 eDNA samples to compare the biological communities and thereby measure the wind farm’s impact on the biology in the area. DTU researchers have since analyzed these samples to inform a year-long study to determine whether wind turbines affect marine biodiversity, and are now considering how this technology can be applied in other efforts, such as coastal resiliency.

Expanding surveying capacity with autonomous robots will enable resource managers to scale up biological monitoring of wind farms and other offshore infrastructure. The data collected by MBARI technology can potentially be used for future environmental impact assessments of wind turbines to ensure that offshore wind energy development is safe for marine life and communities.

Cyanobacteria, or blue-green algae, are microscopic bacteria naturally found in water that can produce harmful toxins during blooms. Blooms of toxic cyanobacteria—known as CHABs (cyanobacterial harmful algal blooms)—risk the health of humans, pets, and livestock and can devastate communities around the Great Lakes.

Lake Erie is a vital drinking water source for more than 2 million people along the Ohio and Michigan coasts and a vibrant economic hub for tourism. Millions of people flock to its shores yearly to enjoy swimming, fishing, and boating during the summer. However, its shallow depth, warm waters, and nutrient runoff from agriculture and urban areas make Lake Erie particularly vulnerable to CHABs, which have become increasingly prevalent in the lake in recent decades. 

Since 2017, NOAA’s Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory (GLERL) has used a trio of 2G ESP instruments to monitor Lake Erie water quality, providing near real-time toxin data about cyanobacteria blooms. The development of 3G-ESP technology offered an opportunity to expand monitoring capabilities. Since 2018, MBARI researchers and our NOAA collaborators have deployed a 3G-ESP LRAUV in Lake Erie, helping resource managers develop detailed toxicity warning systems and forecasts for lake communities. Advanced algorithms developed by MBARI software engineers were used to detect blooms and target water sample collections. The presence and prevalence of cyanobacterial toxins can be assessed immediately using surface plasmon resonance (SPR) technology, with results sent to shore in real time.

In 2023 and 2024, MBARI and NOAA researchers expanded their fieldwork into shallower areas of the lake by installing a 3G ESP on an uncrewed autonomous surface vehicle (ASV) that can survey waters the LRAUV system cannot access. 

MBARI’s ESP technology in the Great Lakes offers continuous, real-time measurements of cyanobacterial toxins, overcoming limitations like cloud cover and satellite constraints that hinder traditional surveys. Capable of assessing bloom biomass and toxin levels, ESP technology has been routinely employed to support informed decision-making to protect public health and local economies.

The California Department of Fish and Wildlife has been monitoring declining returns of endangered Sacramento River winter-run Chinook salmon (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha) in Northern California. Multiple groups have developed plans to help restore salmon populations in the McCloud River. 

The winter-run Chinook salmon are uniquely adapted to the cold, stable, spring-fed waters of the McCloud River, making them the only Chinook in the world that spawn in the summer. With the Shasta Dam blocking access to their historical habitat and droughts projected to intensify in California’s future, returning these salmon to their cold-water refuge—where they can be stewarded again by the Winnemem Wintu tribe—is essential for ensuring their survival and enhancing climate resilience.

MBARI partnered with the University of California, Davis, NOAA’s Southwest Fisheries Science Center, and the Winnemem Wintu Tribe to deploy a 2G ESP device in the McCloud River. This technology detects the genetic markers of Chinook salmon and monitors their downstream movements during times of the year when physical monitoring and fish collection are not possible. Since much of the river is inaccessible, the ESP provides critical insights into the salmon’s habitat use and migration timing, providing information that would otherwise remain unknown. This collaboration also involves members of the Winnemem Wintu tribe, dedicated to restoring Chinook salmon populations and preserving the tribe’s ancestral lands from Buliyum Puyuuk (Mount Shasta) down the Winnemem Waywaket (McCloud River) watershed.

MBARI’s 2G ESP can collect samples containing the genetic fingerprint of salmon fry, helping resource managers track whether they successfully make their way downstream in a noninvasive way. This summer, the team tested this concept by installing a 2G ESP on the McCloud River and collecting 130 eDNA samples that researchers at UC Davis and NOAA are analyzing to assess salmon fry’s presence and relative abundance. 

MBARI researchers navigated unexpected challenges from deploying the 2G ESP in a remote location, including protecting the device from curious bears and other local wildlife and weatherproofing its sensitive instrumentation from the intense summer heat. By leveraging the tribe’s knowledge and the ingenuity of MBARI engineers, the team adapted the ESP to continue operating successfully throughout the summer survey.

Next year, the team will deploy a second 2G ESP to expand salmon monitoring. eDNA is a promising tool for studying salmon migration and detecting pathogens and predators that could impact the success of salmon reintroduction efforts. 

Invasive species, pathogens, and parasites can damage aquatic systems ecologically and economically. They threaten commercial and recreational fishing industries and increase the risk of spreading diseases that can impact human health. The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) has successfully used eDNA as an early detection strategy for biological threats in aquatic systems. However, sample acquisition is expensive and time-consuming. 

In 2017, USGS researchers began using MBARI’s 2G ESP for eDNA monitoring. This pilot project identified the need for an instrument with a smaller footprint and streamlined functionality that could be produced in large numbers and deployed in diverse environments. In 2022, MBARI partnered with the USGS to develop new portable robotic DNA samplers capable of independently monitoring the health of rivers and streams and detecting biological threats. 

As part of a USGS program called the Rapid eDNA Assessment and Deployment Initiative and Network, or READI-Net, MBARI engineers adapted and streamlined our ESP technology to create a scalable, cost-effective DNA sampler. FIDO—the Filtering Instrument for DNA Observations sampler—will enhance early detection and rapid-response methods to help resource managers contain and control aquatic biological threats.

In February, MBARI engineers installed the FIDO sampler on our dock in Moss Landing, California, for a two-week test of the instrument’s basic engineering functionality. These tests provided insight into how resource managers can use FIDO to detect and respond to environmental changes.

Collaborations like READI-Net make MBARI’s engineering innovation more accessible to our peers. MBARI is committed to expanding access to our advanced research tools by prioritizing affordability and scalability and developing partnerships to transfer our technology to third parties for commercial production, opening up new possibilities for our work to have an even broader impact.

In June 2024, the White House Office of Science, Technology, and Policy published the National Aquatic eDNA Strategy, part of a larger effort to advance sustainable management of marine and freshwater resources. Members of the MBARI team lent their expertise to help advance and inform this strategy. This plan elevates eDNA as an important tool for mapping and monitoring biodiversity and calls for increased collaboration among public and private agencies to improve and advance eDNA research and operations. 

Expanding eDNA technology for monitoring and protecting aquatic ecosystems is critical to this strategy. The strategy aims to standardize eDNA practices, improve data sharing, and set performance metrics for reliable, consistent agency use. Through collaborative research and national standards, this strategy supports U.S. conservation goals by offering a science-driven, cost-effective approach to managing and safeguarding aquatic resources. 

In November, MBARI teamed up with our education and conservation partner, the Monterey Bay Aquarium, to host an experiment for our peers in the eDNA technology field to test and validate autonomous eDNA sampling technologies. The Aquarium’s Animal Care team keeps a detailed record of the fishes, invertebrates, and algae that live in their Kelp Forest exhibit, making it an ideal model to assess instruments’ ability to detect genetic markers from a diverse community of marine life. 

The experiment gathered data from MBARI’s 2G ESP, 3G ESP, and FIDO instruments, Cawthron Institute’s TorpeDNA passive sampler being tested through the Synchro research collaboration hosted at MBARI, and instruments commercially available from Aquatic Labs, Dartmouth Oceans Technologies, Inc., McLane Research Laboratories, Inc., Ocean Diagnostics, and Smith-Root.

The nine devices processed water samples from the Kelp Forest exhibit while researchers manually collected and tested water samples for comparison. Findings from this experiment will help the eDNA research community create standardized performance benchmarks that ensure data collected across a range of technologies are consistent. This will improve the scientific community’s ability to share data from biodiversity assessments and enhance decision-making for aquatic environments.