Automatic In Situ Identification of Plankton

Earth´s oceans are a soup of living micro-organisms known as plankton. As the foundation of the food chain for marine life, plankton are also an integral component of the global carbon cycle which regulates the planet´s temperature. In this paper, we present a technique for automatic identification of plankton using a variety of features and classification methods including ensembles. The images were obtained in situ by an instrument known as the flow cytometer and microscope (FlowCAM), that detects particles from a stream of water siphoned directly from the ocean. The images are of necessity of limited resolution, making their identification a rather difficult challenge. We expect that upon completion, our system will become a useful tool for marine biologists to assess the health of the world´s oceans.