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Earth (ESD) Earth Explore Explore Earth Science Climate Change Air Quality Science in Action Multimedia Image Collections Videos Data For Researchers About Us 8 Min Read NASA Researchers Study Coastal Wetlands, Champions of Carbon Capture
Florida’s coastal wetlands are a complex patchwork of ecosystem — consisting of sawgrass marshland, hardwood hammocks, freshwater swamps, and mangrove forests. Credits:
NASA/ Nathan Marder Across the street from the Flamingo Visitor’s Center at the foot of Florida’s Everglades National Park, there was once a thriving mangrove population — part of the largest stand of mangroves in the Western Hemisphere. Now, the skeletal remains of the trees form one of the Everglades’ largest ghost forests.
When Hurricane Irma made landfall in September 2017 as a category 4 storm, violent winds battered the shore and a storm surge swept across the coast, decimating large swaths of mangrove forest. Seven years later, most of the mangroves here haven’t seen any new growth. “At this point, I doubt they’ll recover,” said David Lagomasino, a professor of coastal studies at East Carolina University.
Lagomasino was in the Everglades conducting fieldwork as part of NASA’s BlueFlux Campaign, a three-year project that aims to study how sub-tropical wetlands influence atmospheric levels of carbon dioxide (CO2) and methane. Both gases absorb solar radiation and have a warming effect on Earth’s atmosphere.
A mangrove “ghost forest” near Florida’s southernmost coast houses the remains of a once-thriving mangrove stand. NASA/Nathan Marder The campaign is led by Ben Poulter, a researcher at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, who studies the way human activity and climate change affect the carbon cycle. As wetland vegetation responds to increasing temperatures, rising sea levels, and severe weather, Poulter’s team is trying to determine how much carbon dioxide wetland vegetation removes from the atmosphere and how much methane it produces. Ultimately this research will help scientists develop models to estimate and monitor greenhouse gas concentrations in coastal areas around the globe.
Although coastal wetlands account for less than 2% of the planet’s land-surface area, they remove a significant amount of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. Florida’s coastal wetlands alone remove an estimated 31.8 million metric tons each year. A commercial aircraft would have to circle the globe more than 26,000 times to produce the same amount of carbon dioxide. Coastal wetlands also store carbon in marine sediments, keeping it underground — and out of the atmosphere — for thousands of years. This carbon storage capacity of oceans and wetlands is so robust that it has its own name: blue carbon.
“We’re worried about losing that stored carbon,” Poulter said. “But blue carbon also offers tremendous opportunities for climate mitigation if conservation and restoration are properly supported by science.”
The one-meter core samples collected by Lagomasino will be used to identify historic rates of blue carbon development in mangrove forests and to evaluate how rates of carbon storage respond to specific environmental pressures, like sea level rise or the increasing frequency of tropical cyclones.
Early findings from space-based flux data confirm that, in addition to acting as a sink of carbon dioxide, tropical wetlands are a significant source of methane — a greenhouse gas that traps heat roughly 80 times more efficiently than carbon dioxide. In fact, researchers estimate that Florida’s entire wetland expanse produces enough methane to offset the benefits of wetland carbon removal by about 5%.
Everglades peat contains history of captured carbon
During his most recent fieldwork deployment, Lagomasino used a small skiff to taxi from one research site to the next; many parts of the Everglades are virtually unreachable on foot. At each site, he opened a broad, black case and removed a metallic peat auger, which resembles a giant letter opener. The instrument is designed to extract core samples from soft soils. Everglades peat — which is composed almost entirely of the carbon-rich, partially decomposed roots, stems, and leaves of mangroves — offers a perfect study subject.
Lagomasino plunged the auger into the soil, using his body weight to push the instrument into the ground. Once the sample was secured, he freed the tool from the Earth, presenting a half-cylinder of soil. Each sample was sealed and shipped back to the lab — where they are sliced horizontally into flat discs and analyzed for their age and carbon content.
East Carolina University professor of coastal studies David Lagomasino (right) and his doctoral student Daystar Babanawo explore the Everglades by boat. The plant life here consists almost entirely of mangroves, which can withstand the saltwater tides that characterize coastal wetlands. Scientific studies of Florida’s coastal ecosystems have historically been limited by the relative inaccessibility of the region. NASA/Nathan Marder Everglades peat forms quickly. In Florida’s mangrove forests, around 2 to 10 millimeters of soil are added to the forest floor each year, building up over time like sand filling an hourglass. Much like an ice core, sediment cores offer a window into Earth’s past. The deeper the core, the further into the past one can see. By looking closely at the contents of the soil, researchers can uncover information about the climate conditions from the time the soil formed.
In some parts of the Everglades, soil deposits can reach depths of up to 3 meters (10 feet), where one meter might represent close to 100 years of peat accumulation, Lagomasino said. Deep in the Amazon rainforest, by comparison, a similarly sized, one-meter deposit could take more than 1,000 years to develop. This is important in the context of restoration efforts: in coastal wetlands, peat losses can be restored up to 10 times faster than they might be in other forest types.
Lagomasino holds a sample of peat soil collected from the forest floor. The source of the soil’s elevated carbon content — evident from its coarse, fibrous texture — is primarily the thread-like root hairs routinely recycled by the surrounding mangroves. The presence of water slows the decomposition of this organic material, which is why wetlands can lock carbon away and prevent it from escaping into the atmosphere for thousands of years. NASA/Nathan Marder “There are also significant differences in fluxes between healthy mangroves and degraded ones,” said Lola Fatoyinbo, a research scientist in the Biospheric Sciences Laboratory at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. In areas where mangrove forests are suffering, for example, after a major hurricane, “you end up with more greenhouse gases in the atmosphere,” she said. As wetland ecology responds to intensifying natural and human pressures, the data product will help researchers precisely monitor the impact of ecological changes on global carbon dioxide and methane levels.
Wetland methane: A naturally occurring but potent greenhouse gas
Methane is naturally produced by microbes that live in wetland soils. But as wetland conditions change, the growth rate of methane-producing microbes can spike, releasing the gas into the atmosphere at prodigious rates.
Since methane is a significantly more potent greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide, possessing a warming potential 84 times greater over a 25-year period, methane emissions undermine some of the beneficial services that blue carbon ecosystems provide as natural sinks for atmospheric carbon dioxide.
While Lagomasino studied the soil to understand long-term storage of greenhouse gases, Lola Fatoyinbo, a research scientist in NASA’s Biospheric Sciences Lab, and Peter Raymond, an ecologist at Yale University’s School of the Environment, measured the rate at which these gases are exchanged between wetland vegetation and the atmosphere. This metric is known as gaseous flux.
Lagomasino holds a sample of peat soil collected from the forest floor. The presence of water slows the decomposition of this organic material, which is why wetlands can lock carbon away and prevent it from escaping into the atmosphere for thousands of years. NASA/Nathan Marder NASA/Nathan Marder The scientists measure flux using chambers designed to adhere neatly to points where significant rates of gas exchange occur. They secure box-like chambers to above-ground roots and branches while domed chambers measure gas escaping from the forest floor. The concentration of gases trapped in each chamber is measured over time.
In general, as the health of wetland ecology declines, less carbon dioxide is removed, and more methane is released. But the exact nature of the relationship between wetland health and gaseous flux is not well understood. What does flux look like in ghost forests, for example? And how do more subtle changes in variables like canopy coverage or species distribution influence levels of carbon dioxide sequestration or methane production?
“We’re especially interested in the methane part,” Fatoyinbo said. “It’s the least understood, and there’s a lot more of it than we previously thought.”
Based on data collected during BlueFlux fieldwork, “we’re finding that coastal wetlands remove massive amounts of carbon dioxide and produce substantial amounts of methane,” Poulter said. “But overall, these ecosystems appear to provide a net climate benefit, removing more greenhouse gases than they produce.” That could change as Florida’s wetlands respond to continued climate disturbances.
The future of South Florida’s ecology
Florida’s wetlands are roughly 5,000 years old. But in just the past century, more than half of the state’s original wetland coverage has been lost as vegetation was cleared and water was drained to accommodate the growing population. The Everglades system now contains 65% less peat and 77% less stored carbon than it did prior to drainage. The future of the ecosystem — which is not only an important reservoir for atmospheric carbon, but a source of drinking water for more than 7 million Floridians and a home to flora and fauna found nowhere else on Earth — is uncertain.
Scientists who have dedicated their careers to understanding and restoring South Florida’s ecology are hopeful. “Nature and people can coexist,” said Meenakshi Chabba, an ecologist and resilience scientist at the Everglades Foundation in Florida’s Miami-Dade County. “But we need good science and good management to reach that goal.”
The next step for NASA’s BlueFlux campaign is the development of a satellite-based data product that can help regional stakeholders evaluate in real-time how Florida’s wetlands are responding to restoration efforts designed to protect one of the state’s most precious natural resources — and all those who depend on it.
By Nathan Marder
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland
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Nathan Marder
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Last Updated Mar 13, 2025 Editor Jenny Marder Contact Nathan Marder Related Terms
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4 Min Read NASA Cameras on Blue Ghost Capture First-of-its-Kind Moon Landing Footage
This compressed, resolution-limited video features a preliminary sequence of the Blue Ghost final descent and landing that NASA researchers stitched together from SCALPSS 1.1’s four short-focal-length cameras, which were capturing photos at 8 frames per second. Altitude data is approximate. Credits: NASA/Olivia Tyrrell A team at NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia, has captured first-of-its-kind imagery of a lunar lander’s engine plumes interacting with the Moon’s surface, a key piece of data as trips to the Moon increase in the coming years under the agency’s Artemis campaign.
The Stereo Cameras for Lunar-Plume Surface Studies (SCALPSS) 1.1 instrument took the images during the descent and successful soft landing of Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost lunar lander on the Moon’s Mare Crisium region on March 2, as part of NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) initiative.
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This compressed, resolution-limited video features a preliminary sequence of the Blue Ghost final descent and landing that NASA researchers stitched together from SCALPSS 1.1’s four short-focal-length cameras, which were capturing photos at 8 frames per second. Altitude data is approximate.NASA/Olivia Tyrrell The compressed, resolution-limited video features a preliminary sequence that NASA researchers stitched together from SCALPSS 1.1’s four short-focal-length cameras, which were capturing photos at 8 frames per second during the descent and landing.
The sequence, using approximate altitude data, begins roughly 91 feet (28 meters) above the surface. The descent images show evidence that the onset of the interaction between Blue Ghost’s reaction control thruster plumes and the surface begins at roughly 49 feet (15 meters). As the descent continues, the interaction becomes increasingly complex, with the plumes vigorously kicking up the lunar dust, soil and rocks — collectively known as regolith. After touchdown, the thrusters shut off and the dust settles. The lander levels a bit and the lunar terrain beneath and immediately around it becomes visible.
Although the data is still preliminary, the 3000-plus images we captured appear to contain exactly the type of information we were hoping for…
Rob Maddock
SCALPSS project manager
“Although the data is still preliminary, the 3000-plus images we captured appear to contain exactly the type of information we were hoping for in order to better understand plume-surface interaction and learn how to accurately model the phenomenon based on the number, size, thrust and configuration of the engines,” said Rob Maddock, SCALPSS project manager. “The data is vital to reducing risk in the design and operation of future lunar landers as well as surface infrastructure that may be in the vicinity. We have an absolutely amazing team of scientists and engineers, and I couldn’t be prouder of each and every one of them.”
As trips to the Moon increase and the number of payloads touching down in proximity to one another grows, scientists and engineers need to accurately predict the effects of landings. Data from SCALPSS will better inform future robotic and crewed Moon landings.
The SCALPSS 1.1 technology includes six cameras in all, four short focal length and two long focal length. The long-focal-length cameras allowed the instrument to begin taking images at a higher altitude, prior to the onset of the plume-surface interaction, to provide a more accurate before-and-after comparison of the surface. Using a technique called stereo photogrammetry, the team will later combine the overlapping images – one set from the long-focal-length cameras, another from the short focal length – to create 3D digital elevation maps of the surface.
This animation shows the arrangement of the six SCALPSS 1.1 cameras and the instrument’s data storage unit. The cameras are integrated around the base of the Blue Ghost lander. Credit: NASA/Advanced Concepts Lab The instrument is still operating on the Moon and as the light and shadows move during the long lunar day, it will see more surface details under and immediately around the lander. The team also hopes to capture images during the transition to lunar night to observe how the dust responds to the change.
“The successful SCALPSS operation is a key step in gathering fundamental knowledge about landing and operating on the Moon, and this technology is already providing data that could inform future missions,” said Michelle Munk, SCALPSS principal investigator.
The successful SCALPSS operation is a key step in gathering fundamental knowledge about landing and operating on the Moon, and this technology is already providing data that could inform future missions
Michelle Munk
SCALPSS principal investigator
It will take the team several months to fully process the data from the Blue Ghost landing. They plan to issue raw images from SCALPSS 1.1 publicly through NASA’s Planetary Data System within six months.
The team is already preparing for its next flight on Blue Origin’s Blue Moon lander, scheduled to launch later this year. The next version of SCALPSS is undergoing thermal vacuum testing at NASA Langley ahead of a late-March delivery to Blue Origin.
The SCALPSS 1.1 project is funded by the Space Technology Mission Directorate’s Game Changing Development program.
NASA is working with several American companies to deliver science and technology to the lunar surface under the CLPS initiative. Through this opportunity, various companies from a select group of vendors bid on delivering payloads for NASA including everything from payload integration and operations, to launching from Earth and landing on the surface of the Moon.
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Joe Atkinson
Public Affairs Officer, NASA Langley Research Center
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5 min read
NASA’s Record-Shattering, Theory-Breaking MMS Mission Turns 10
Since its launch on March 12, 2015, NASA’s MMS, or Magnetospheric Multiscale, mission has been rewriting our understanding of a key physical process that is important across the universe, from black holes to the Sun to Earth’s protective magnetic field.
This process, called magnetic reconnection, occurs when magnetic field lines tangle and explosively realign, flinging away nearby particles. Around Earth, a single magnetic reconnection event can release as much energy in a couple of hours as the entire United States uses in a day.
Over the past 10 years, thousands of research papers with discoveries by MMS have enabled a wide range of technical and scientific advances, such as those about the conditions on the Sun that create space weather, which can impact technology and communications at Earth. It has also enabled insights for fusion energy technologies.
“The MMS mission has been a very important asset in NASA’s heliophysics fleet observatory,” said Guan Le, MMS mission lead at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. “It has utterly changed how we understand magnetic reconnection.”
An infographic noting the accomplishments of NASA’s Magnetospheric Multiscale mission after 10 years in space. NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center/Kristen Perrin Studying magnetic reconnection is key to understanding where this energy goes and how it can affect us down on the ground.
“The MMS mission not only studies universal physical processes, but it also allows us to probe the mechanisms that connect big eruptions on the Sun to things we experience on Earth, such as auroras, geomagnetic storms, and even power outages in extreme cases,” said Kevin Genestreti, MMS science deputy principal investigator and lead scientist at Southwest Research Institute’s Space Sector in Durham, New Hampshire.
The Perfect Laboratory
Using four identical spacecraft, MMS studies magnetic reconnection while traveling in a long, oval-shaped orbit around Earth — a perfect laboratory for closely studying magnetic reconnection.
“You can measure reconnection in a laboratory, but the scales are so very small there that you can’t make the detailed measurements needed to really understand reconnection,” said Jim Burch, principal investigator for MMS at the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio, Texas.
Magnetic reconnection primarily happens in two locations around Earth, one located on the side facing the Sun, and another behind Earth farther away from the Sun. In their orbit, the four MMS spacecraft repeatedly pass through these key locations.
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This artist’s concept shows magnetic reconnection at Earth during a solar storm. NASA Goddard’s Conceptual Image Lab/Krystofer Kim Before MMS, scientists only had a limited understanding of magnetic reconnection. But by improving instrument measurement speeds tenfold, MMS has been able to dramatically reshape what we know about the process. To date, MMS data has led to over 1,500 published scientific articles.
“For example, it turned out that the basic theory of reconnection in turbulent regions was wrong because previous missions couldn’t make observations at the level MMS can,” Burch said. “We also found reconnection in a lot of places that weren’t predicted.”
Working out new and refined theories of magnetic reconnection was an integral part of the MMS mission from the outset.
“One of the truly groundbreaking findings from MMS is that the heart of reconnection has a well-ordered beat – even if everything around is turbulent,” said Michael Hesse, MMS theory and modeling lead at NASA’s Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley. “This shows that precision measurement can decide between competing theories.”
Enabling Breakthroughs for Science and Scientists
The mission’s successes have also been a boon to young scientists, who are closely involved with the mission at all levels.
“In addition to its scientific achievements, it has also helped almost 50 students get doctorate degrees and enabled early career scientists to grow into leadership positions,” Le said.
To foster young scientists, MMS provides early career research grants to team members. The MMS team also created “Leads In-Training” roles to bring early career scientists to the table for big mission decisions and provide them the experience they need to move into leadership positions. The program has been so successful it is now required for all NASA Heliophysics missions.
Breaking Records
Beyond its scientific achievements, MMS also holds several records. Only months after launch, MMS received its first Guinness World Record for highest GPS fix at 44,000 miles above Earth. It would later shatter this record as it moved into a longer orbit, taking it 116,300 miles — halfway to the Moon — away from GPS transponders at Earth. GPS is designed to send signals down toward Earth, so using it in space, where signals are weak, is challenging. By using GPS at high altitudes, MMS has shown its potential for other applications.
“This GPS demonstration has been of great interest for the developers of the Artemis missions, which is testing GPS at lunar distances,” said Jim Clapsadle, MMS mission director at NASA Goddard.
The mission also holds the Guinness World Record for smallest satellite formation, with just 2.6 miles between spacecraft. Over the years, MMS’ four spacecraft have flown in lines and pyramid-shaped formations from 5 to 100 miles across to help scientists study magnetic reconnection on a range of scales. In that time, the spacecraft’s health has remained remarkably well.
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This artist’s concept beauty pass shows the MMS spacecraft flying on Earth’s nightside, where MMS continues to study magnetic reconnection. NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center Conceptual Image Lab “The hardware has proved very reliable, even now, 10 years into flight,” said Trevor Williams, MMS flight dynamics lead at NASA Goddard.
After launch, Williams and the flight operations team came up with more fuel-efficient ways to maneuver the spacecraft and keep them at their designated separations. As a result, the mission still has about a fourth of the fuel it launched with. This economy leaves enough fuel to continue operating the mission for decades. That’s good news to mission scientists who are eager to continue studying magnetic reconnection with MMS.
“We have thousands of magnetic reconnection events on the day side, but far fewer on the nightside,” Burch said. “But over the next three years we’ll be in a prime location to finish investigating nightside reconnection.”
By Mara Johnson-Groh
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.
Media Contact: Sarah Frazier
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Last Updated Mar 12, 2025 Editor Miles Hatfield Contact Mara Johnson-Groh Location Goddard Space Flight Center Related Terms
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