Innis, Michelle. "Scientists Inspect the Great Barrier Reef, From 28,000 Feet Above." The New York Times. The New York Times Company, 26 Sept. 2016. Web. 28 Sept. 2016. http://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/09/27/science/great-barrier-reef-nasa-australia.html?_r=0
Scientists are putting together a collection of data from the Great Barrier Reef using aerial images from 28,000 feet above the reef. Using a NASA gulfstream jet, a sensor called a Prism (Portable Remote Imaging Spectrometer) picks up light that bounces off of the various objects in the reef. Each object has it’s own wavelength, and the Prism converts these wavelengths into bands of color, using the color to make a high resolution image of the reef. Prior to this technology, people could only study reefs through small scale scuba diving trips and studies— however, these cannot be extrapolated to the entire reef due to the fact that the Great Barrier Reef is the size of Germany. Recently, there has been a problem with coral bleaching, which occurs when the water warms and the coral evict algae, which normally has a symbiotic relationship with the coral because the algae are photosynthetic and make food for the coral. Scientists hope to find out how reefs adapt to man-made and natural stresses, how they calcify, and how much photosynthesis takes place on reefs and where.
Reefs are important to study and understand because they provide food and shelter to a quarter of the ocean’s species, protect coastal communities from hazardous weather, and provide revenue from fishing and tourism. It is imperative for agencies like NASA to fund reef studies because many of the countries that border these reefs are unable to pay for equipment to monitor and preserve the reefs. The data collected from this study will be plotted against the effects of wave stress, rising sea temperatures, and pollution and overfishing in order to give people a definitive explanation of how and why human activities are causing coral bleaching, and hopefully suggest a way that people can stop the destruction of biodiversity in the reefs.
Overall, I found this article to be informative and compelling. The author explained the study well and gave the reader an understanding of why it is so important to study reefs. However, the article jumped around and was hard to follow. The author switched back and forth between reef science and the study being discussed, which was confusing. The author also did not give the dates that this study is taking place. Finally, I would have liked for the author to explain exactly why coral bleaching damages biodiversity in the reefs.
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ReplyDeleteInnis, Michelle. "Scientists Inspect the Great Barrier Reef, From 28,000 Feet Above." The New
ReplyDeleteYork Times. The New York Times Company, 26 Sept. 2016. Web. 28 Sept. 2016. http://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/09/27/science/great-barrier-reef-nasa-australia.html?_r=0
Maggie wrote an amazing and thorough review of the article “Scientists Inspect the Great Barrier Reef, From 28,000 Feet Above” by Michelle Innis. I thought that Maggie did an excellent job of presenting and explaining the NASA technology that uses light to create images of the Great Barrier Reef. She was able to successfully describe how an advanced machine completes a complex task so that it is easy to understand as a reader. She did a good job of summarizing the article so that only the most important points were included in her review. Maggie detailed the Prism sensor, explained why it is such an improvement in the study of coral reefs, and then recounted the problems that the Great Barrier Reef is presently facing and how the scientists plan to use the sensor to combat the coral bleaching. Maggie also wrote a compelling paragraph on the importance of this article by describing the positive effects that coral reefs have on marine species and coastal communities.
Overall, Maggie wrote a fascinating and well-rounded article review, but there are two things that she could add that would improve it ever so slightly. I think that her overall response could be strengthened if she included a quote from the article or one of the experts studying coral reefs. Secondly, she could add more details regarding the specific species of reefs that are being bleached or of the marine species that are being harmed.
From reading this current event response to the article “Scientists Inspect the Great Barrier Reef, From 28,000 Feet Above,” I learned about an impressive new technological advancement involving a gulfstream jet and a sensor that uses light to create accurate images. I also discovered that it is being used to help scientists study how the coral reefs are being negatively affected by the increase in water temperatures. I agree with Maggie that this is an important subject that could lead to further conclusions involving the marine species in the Great Barrier Reef and possibly improve the damage that is being done to them.
Innis, Michelle. "Scientists Inspect the Great Barrier Reef, From 28,000 Feet Above." The New York Times. The New York Times Company, 26 Sept. 2016. Web. 28 Sept. 2016.
ReplyDeleteMaggie did a great job on her review of "Scientists Inspect the Great Barrier Reef, From 28,000 Feet Above" by Michelle Innis. I particularly enjoyed how she defined key terms/broke down acronyms. For example, she explained that “Prism” stood for “Portable Remote Imaging Spectrometer.” In addition, she then went on to explain how a “Prism” “picks up light that bounces off of the various objects in the reef.” Another thing Maggie did proficiently was her inclusion of details about how we interpret “wavelengths into bands of color, using the color to make a high resolution image of the reef.” I found this to be truly fascinating information and her excellent description made the complex topic easily comprehensible. A third item that she did well was explaining why the health of coral reefs is important to our lives. By explaining the issue of “coral bleaching” and its effect on the ocean’s diversity of life readers understand why this new research is so important.
However, Maggie did have two areas of her review in which she could improve. Primarily, I would recommend that Maggie use more quotations from scientists working with the technology to really understand the impact of this new technological innovation. Although Maggie paraphrases well the real words of the researchers always can make a review stronger and easier to understand. To improve her lack of quotes, the solution is simple: find more quotes from the article to analyze and include them in her review. Secondarily I would recommend Maggie add more details about how the coral reefs are being affected by global warming. Although she touches on it briefly, there could definitely been further analysis and description about such a keystone issue. An easy solution is just to read more into the article by perhaps doing some outside research to ensure she truly understands how coral reefs connect to global warming.
Overall, Maggie did a brilliant job of discussing some new research being done on something that affects everyone’s lives. I learned about a new impressive technological advancement involving a gulfstream jet and a sensor that uses light to create accurate images that is being used to help study, quantitatively, how coral reefs are being affected by warming oceans. Although, we often hear of the negatives of coral bleaching, Maggie’s review demonstrated that we do not truly know how bad it is. Presumably this new technology and research being conducted could tell us a lot about how much time we have before we reach the point of no return, in terms of global warming, assuming we have not already reached that point. An important issue, I found this article review illuminating and noteworthy to any human being on this Earth.
Innis, Michelle. "Scientists Inspect the Great Barrier Reef, From 28,000 Feet Above." The New York Times. The New York Times Company, 26 Sept. 2016. Web. 28 Sept. 2016. http://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/09/27/science/great-barrier-reef-nasa-australia.html?_r=0
ReplyDeleteI read Maggie McKelvy’s review of the New York Times article, “Scientists Inspect the Great Barrier Reef, From 28,000 Feet Above” and thought that she did a very good job. I particularly liked her summary of the article and its main points. She kept her summary short and concise, which summaries are supposed to be, yet still included enough information for the reader to understand what happened in the article. In addition, I liked her explanation about why the article was relevant and important. By including the fact that “the reefs provide food and shelter to a quarter of the ocean’s species, protect coastal communities from hazardous weather, and provide revenue from fishing and tourism” , the reader was able to truly understand the importance of both the article and the reefs as a whole. I also thought that Maggie did a great job of explaining the NASA technology that uses light to create images of the Great Barrier Reef. This type of technology can be seen as confusing to understand, however she was able to successfully describe how an advanced machine completes a complex task in a way that was easy to understand.
Although Maggie did a very good job in her review, she could use some improvement. I thought that she should have quoted some parts of the article, as this always emphasizes the validity of everything being said. I believe this is an important part of an article’s review and it should have been included. In addition, Maggie could have added more details about how the coral reefs are being affected by global warming. While Maggie did mention it, she never went into detail on the issue. However, I think that Maggie still wrote an excellent review.
I thought that the review was written very well and Maggie chose a great article to talk about. I think that the topic is very prevalent since the reefs provide food and shelter for such a large percent of ocean species. Maggie has further educated me on the topic. I never knew about this topic before reading Maggie’s review and now feel knowledgeable on this topic. Overall, I really enjoyed Maggie’s review and learned a lot from it.
Innis, Michelle. "Scientists Inspect the Great Barrier Reef, From 28,000 Feet Above." The New York Times. The New York Times Company, 26 Sept. 2016. Web. 28 Sept. 2016.
ReplyDeletehttp://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/09/27/science/great-barrier-reef-nasa-australia.html?_r=0
Maggie composed a well-written review of the article “Scientists Inspect the Great Barrier Reef, From 28,000 Feet Above.” First, she did a good job of concisely yet thoroughly summarizing both the major and minor points of the article. Briefly, the article describes a new technology that capable of producing very high quality images of the reef. The technology uses a spectrometer to convert the spectral structure of each object – sand, algae, and coral – and breaks it into hundreds of bands of color. This is far preferable to the previous method – scientists generally had divers scout small areas of the reef and extrapolated to gouge the health of the entire reef. Scientists are hopeful that this data will give them a better indication as to what is causing coral bleaching, a threat to the health of corals across the world. Second, Maggie did a good job of integrating her own analysis regarding the reef and the importance of the reef into her review. Reefs are essential in preserving ocean biodiversity, in addition to providing revenue from fishing and tourism. The success of this technology is of paramount importance to the future of the oceans. Third, Maggie did a good job of critiquing the article: I likewise believed that the author failed to keep focus and alternated between topics far too often.
Though the review was generally well written, there are a few areas that could be improved. First, Maggie did not incorporate any quotes into her review: doing so would have provided more insight into the topic and also would have added to the depth of her review. Similarly, there was certainly room for specific data to be added. Second, Maggie could have added information concerning the Great Barrier Reef in general instead of only focusing on the technology and reefs in general.
The article and review were both very insightful. The author of the article succeeded in detailing the importance of reefs, information regarding the Great Barrier Reef, and this emerging technology. The author furthermore sparked my interest in the technology and drove me to wonder about other uses for the technology and the state of emerging scientific technology in general. Furthermore, I learned even more about the impact of reefs on their environment and their significant effect on surrounding biodiversity.
Isabel Caton
ReplyDeleteCurrent Event
Innis, Michelle. "Scientists Inspect the Great Barrier Reef, From 28,000 Feet Above." The New York Times. The New York Times Company, 26 Sept. 2016. Web. 28 Sept. 2016. http://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/09/27/science/great-barrier-reef-nasa-australia.html?_r=0
I read Maggie’s review on the article “Scientists Inspect the Great Barrier Reef, From 28,000 Feet Above” by Michelle Innis. Maggie did a really good job giving a summary of the article and specified the article's main points. She included enough information so that the reader could understand the article. I think she did a very good job explaining why the article is relevant in society today. I was able to understand the importance of the reefs as a whole. The technology that NASA is using to create the images of the Great Barrier Reef, this technology can be difficult to understand but Maggie did a good job explaining it.
Though the review was well done, there are a few things that she could improve. I think she could have included more quotes from the article in her review, so that the reader could get a sense of the author's tone. Quotes and data from the article are good because they emphasis the validity of what the author is saying. Also I wish she had added some more specific details about the reefs that are being harmed.
Overall I think Maggie did a great job explaining the issue I learned about the new technology that is using light to create accurate images. From this article I am now more interested in the technology that other scientist are using. I also learned how these are helping scientists study the negative effects from the increasing water temperature. I think that this is an important topic and this can lead to further investigations of marine species and improve the damage in the Reefs.
Evelyn Kluemper
ReplyDelete10/13/16
AP Biology
Innis, Michelle. "Scientists Inspect the Great Barrier Reef, From 28,000 Feet Above." The New York Times. The New York Times Company, 26 Sept. 2016. Web. 28 Sept. 2016. http://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/09/27/science/great-barrier-reef-nasa-australia.html?_r=0
Maggie’s review of "Scientists Inspect the Great Barrier Reef, From 28,000 Feet Above” by Michelle Innis is interesting. She explained the complicated technology by NASA very well, as I was able to understand it with little background knowledge on the topic. Maggie also described why coral reefs are relevant to society today and how they being harmed due to climate change. Finally, the critique of the article was honest.
The review would have been even better if there were quotes by experts on the topic. Also, the topic would be easier to understand if there was additional, outside information on the Great Barrier Reef.
Although I knew that global warming was harming the Great Barrier Reef, I had no idea how much reefs directly impacts our society. This adds a sense of urgency to save these wonderful ecosystems.
AP Biology George Daskalakis
ReplyDeleteCurrent Event 4 10/12/16
Innis, Michelle. "Scientists Inspect the Great Barrier Reef, From 28,000 Feet Above." The New
York Times. The New York Times Company, 26 Sept. 2016. Web. 28 Sept. 2016. http://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/09/27/science/great-barrier-reef-nasa-australia.html?_r=0
Maggie wrote a great and review of the article “Scientists Inspect the Great Barrier Reef, From 28,000 Feet Above” by Michelle Innis. I thought that Maggie did a good job of summarizing the article so that only the most important points were included in her review. Maggie also wrote a paragraph on the importance of this article by describing the positive effects that coral reefs have on marine species and coastal communities, which was very useful. Lastly, she also did an excellent job of presenting and explaining the NASA technology that uses light to create images of the Great Barrier Reef. Even though Maggie did a great job review the article she read, there are some things that she could add that would improve her review. I think that she could add more details regarding the specific species of reefs that are being bleached. Also, her overall response could be strengthened if she included a quote from the article or one of the experts studying coral reefs. After reading Maggie’s response to the article “Scientists Inspect the Great Barrier Reef, From 28,000 Feet Above,” I learned about an new technological advancement involving a gulfstream jet and a sensor that uses light to create accurate images. I agree with Maggie that this is an important subject that could lead to further conclusions involving the marine species in the Great Barrier Reef, and how they will be effected.
Innis, Michelle. "Scientists Inspect the Great Barrier Reef, From 28,000 Feet Above." The New York Times. The New York Times Company, 26 Sept. 2016. Web. 28 Sept. 2016. http://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/09/27/science/great-barrier-reef-nasa-australia.html?_r=0
ReplyDeleteMaggie's review of the article in the New York Times, "Scientists Inspect the Great Barrier Reef, From 28,000 Feet Above” by Michelle Innis was very insightful and educational. She did a great job providing a brief but complete summary of this article. Maggie took a complex idea and was able to describe in a simple way that made it easy for the reader to understand. While her summary was short, she managed to get across key points such as the sensor called Prism, what makes reefs important, and why they are important to study.
I think while Maggie's review was excellent, incorporating quotes and pointing out specific data figures would have greatly improved the quality of her writing. Adding quotes from the article would have added to arguments, while also providing evidence for her statements. Furthermore, including specific data points would have made her statements more credible and sustainable.
From her review of the article on the Great Barrier Reef, I learned that reefs are an important issue that should be moved more in the open and be discussed more frequently. Maggie also did a great job of explaining how this topic is relevant to everyone. I feel very enlightened on the topic of reefs and species surrounding them as well as lucky to have had the opportunity to have read such a well written review.