SeaBASS Format Preparation

The SeaWiFS Bio-optical Archive and Storage System (SeaBASS) is a publicly shared archive hosted by NASA’s Ocean Biology Processing Group (OBPG). SeaBASS stores in situ oceanographic and atmospheric data such as measurements of optical properties, phytoplankton pigment concentrations, water temperature and salinity measurements, stimulated fluorescence, and aerosol optical thickness measurements. Data submitted to SeaBASS must be prepared in a specific format to enable efficient data integration and storage. This data format has been developed to be simple, have global portability across all operating systems, and to be web accessible.

SeaBASS files are text files that begin with a section of metadata information, which includes mandatory and optional or conditional headers and keywords. A data matrix should follow the metadata section.

Specific guidelines on how to format data for plankton and particle imagery can be found here, and the general SeaBASS documentation website is located here.

The details of the development and application of the plankton and particle imagery data format can be found in the Neely et al paper, “Standards and practices for reporting plankton and other particle observations from images.”