Captured in March 2024, this satellite image of the Gulf of Oman comes from an instrument aboard the PACE spacecraft. The picture of a phytoplankton bloom is not quite natural-color, at least not as our eyes would see it. Instead, engineers combined data taken from multiple wavelengths and adjusted it to bring out the fine details. It’s not what we’d see by eye, but every feature you see here is real.
Traditionally, the only way to identify the species of a phytoplankton bloom like this one is by taking a sample directly. But PACE’s instruments can detect hundreds of wavelengths of light, offering enough color detail that scientists may soon be able to identify and track phytoplankton species by satellite image alone. I wonder if distinguishing species could also provide some quantitative flow visualization from a series of these images. In the meantime, at least we can enjoy the view! (Image credit: J. Knuble; via NASA Earth Observatory)