{"id":125406,"date":"2026-01-20T21:24:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-20T21:24:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/125406\/"},"modified":"2026-01-20T21:24:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-20T21:24:09","slug":"researchers-use-ai-to-track-a-global-increase-in-floating-seaweed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/125406\/","title":{"rendered":"Researchers use AI to track a global increase in floating seaweed"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Sargassum
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSargassum covers Playa Flamenco in Puerto Rico in 2015. By Se\u00e1n Kinane.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\tListen:<\/p>\n

Researchers from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the University of South Florida used artificial intelligence to find an increase in floating algae across the ocean.<\/p>\n

One researcher calls the uptick in floating seaweed a double-edged sword.<\/p>\n

The researchers conducted a comprehensive study of global floating macroalgae and found that blooms are expanding across the ocean.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Dr. Chuanmin Hu is a professor at the USF College of Marine Science and a senior author of the study.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He said the trends are likely the result of changes to currents and nutrients, with ocean warming due to climate change being a factor.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s good for a healthy ecosystem. But when you have too much good stuff at the wrong time and the wrong location, it becomes bad for this case.\u201d Hu told WMNF.<\/p>\n

In open water, macroalgae can provide critical habitat for marine life and have a positive impact on fisheries, serving as a nursery for many species.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But once the algae reach coastal waters, they can cause harm to tourism, economies, and the health of people and marine life.<\/p>\n

To conduct the study, Hu and his colleagues used artificial intelligence to scan 1.2 million satellite images of the ocean, focusing on 13 zones and five types of algae.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThe paper we just published is the first paper to show a global picture of where we can find macroalgae, the big algae, that is visible to the human eye,\u201d Hu said.<\/p>\n

Locally, Hu said Tampa Bay beaches would mostly be immune to the blooms, as they would end up on the east coast of Florida.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sargassum covers Playa Flamenco in Puerto Rico in 2015. By Se\u00e1n Kinane. Listen: Researchers from the National Oceanic…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":125407,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[62175,135,137,136],"class_list":["post-125406","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tampa","tag-algae-bloom","tag-tampa","tag-tampa-headlines","tag-tampa-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125406","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=125406"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125406\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/125407"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=125406"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=125406"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=125406"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}