Session Lead: Bruce Vogt (NOAA Chesapeake Bay Office)

Co-Lead(s): Christina Garvey

Session Format: Oral presentations

Session Description: 

The Chesapeake Bay Program Partnership’s efforts, guided by the revised Chesapeake Bay Watershed Agreement (Beyond 2025), are entering a critical new phase defined by adaptive management and long-term goals extending to 2040. Achieving the Agreement’s commitment to thriving habitat, fisheries and wildlife and addressing recommendations from the Comprehensive Evaluation of System Response Report require a significant evolution in how we monitor, assess, and manage the Bay’s living aquatic resources—including critical habitats (e.g., wetlands, SAV, oyster reefs) and ecologically or commercially important species (e.g., blue crab, striped bass, forage species, invasive blue catfish). As the Bay faces a “dynamic future” characterized by environmental variability, evolving human pressures, and the emergence of new technologies, the established methods for monitoring, assessing, and researching these resources must adapt.


This session invites presentations that showcase next generation tools and transdisciplinary approaches that are reshaping how we understand and manage the Bay’s living resources and the habitats they depend on. We seek contributions that move beyond traditional ecological monitoring to embrace innovative methodologies that enhance the speed, scale, and utility of living resource data for management decisions.

Key topics and areas of interest include:

  • Advanced Monitoring and Data Collection: New applications of high-resolution remote sensing (aerial, satellite, acoustic), autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs), and in-situ monitoring networks for tracking species movement, habitat change (e.g., SAV or oyster reef growth), and water quality impacts on biota.
  • Machine Learning and AI in Assessment: Novel uses of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) techniques for processing complex datasets, such as automated species identification from acoustic or image data, forecasting fisheries stock dynamics, modeling habitat suitability under future climate scenarios, or emulating mechanistic ecosystem models.
  • Integrating Social and Ecological Data: Research that successfully merges ecological data (e.g., fish stock surveys, oyster restoration success) with social science data (e.g., human behavior, stakeholder acceptance, economic models).
  • “Team Science” for Management: Case studies and methodologies that demonstrate effective transdisciplinary collaboration between resource managers, modelers, researchers, and stakeholders to translate complex ecological research into timely, actionable management policy for specific species or habitat restoration targets.
  • Addressing Data Challenges: Strategies for managing the high volume of new data, ensuring data quality, and effectively communicating complex or uncertain results (especially those derived from AI/ML) to policymakers and the public in a manner that builds trust.
  • Integrating Diverse Data Streams: Methodologies for synthesizing information from multiple sources—such as citizen science, historical surveys, and novel high-frequency data—to create comprehensive and robust assessments that guide living resource management and restoration targets.

By bringing together scientists and managers focused on aquatic resources, this session aims to articulate a roadmap for leveraging new technologies and “team science” to sustain and accelerate progress toward a healthy Chesapeake Bay in the face of future challenges.

Presentations (Session 15 Abstracts)

  1. Hongsheng Bi, Cailian Liu: High-Frequency Imaging of Phytoplankton and Zooplankton Dynamics in the Chesapeake Bay
  2. Veronica Malabanan Lucchese: Fish, People, and Power: Mapping Networks Between Invasive and Native Species in Coastal Systems
  3. Alexandria Rhodes, Victoria Hill, PhD & Richard Zimmerman, PhD: Mapping Submerged Aquatic Vegetation Around the Tangier-Smith Archipelago Using Satellite Imagery
  4. Matthew Ogburn, Allison Blanchette: Leveraging Underwater Video, High-Resolution Sonar, eDNA, and Animal Telemetry for Fisheries and Fish Habitat Monitoring
  5. Julie Reichert-Nguyen, Julia Fucci, Ron Vogel, Jamileh Soueidan, Marjorie Friedrichs, Aaron Bever, Charles Pellerin, Bruce Vogt: From Buoys, Satellites, and Models: Data Comparisons to Inform Marine Heatwave Forecasting for Fisheries Management Application
  6. Genny Nesslage, Vyacheslav Lyubchich, Glenn Davis, Eric Durell, Mary Fabrizio, Marjorie Friedrichs, James Gartland, Robert Latour, Romuald Lipcius, Julie Reichert-Nguyen, Pierre St-Laurent, Troy Tuckey, Beth Versak: Quantifying linked rare events in fish and environmental Chesapeake Bay time series
  7. Robert Daniels, Ava Ellett: Chesapeake Bay Vibrio Seasonal Outlook
  8. Allison Dreiss, Ryan E. Langendorf, Ryan Woodland, Vyacheslav Lyubchich, Jeremy Testa: Modeling benthic biomass responses to climate change in the Chesapeake Bay
  9. Theresa Davenport, Kenny Rose, Limin Sun, William Nardin, Lorie Staver, Matt Gray, Cindy Palinkas, Ming Li, Vincent Pham, Vyacheslav Lyubchich, Anna Johnson, Megan Barnier, Evan Mazur: Coupling hydrodynamic, water quality, and habitat suitability models to assess the habitat co-benefits from living shorelines
  10. Emi McGeady: Evaluating Localized Food Web Response to Oyster Restoration using a 3D Multispecies Individual-Based Model
  11. Vaskar Nepal, Mary C Fabrizio; Troy D. Tuckey, Colin Hawes, Marjorie A.M. Friedrichs, Pierre St-Laurent, Aaron J. Bever: Mechanistic Habitat Modeling for Chesapeake Bay Fish and Shellfish: From Individual Physiology to Management Tool
  12. Colin A. Hawes, Marjorie A.M. Friedrichs, Pierre St-Laurent, Vaskar Nepal, Mary C. Fabrizio, Troy D. Tuckey, Aaron J. Bever: Modeling Juvenile Atlantic Croaker Habitat Suitability: Impacts of Future Climate and Nutrient Management
  13. Aaron Bever, Colin Hawes, Marjorie A.M. Friedrichs, Pierre St-Laurent, Vaskar Nepal, Mary C. Fabrizio, Troy Tuckey: Realtime Forecasting and Seasonal Summaries of Habitat for Fishes in Chesapeake Bay
  14. Matthew Gray, Theresa Daven, William Nardin, Elizabeth North, Kenny Rose, and Jeremy Testa: Designing Oyster Restoration for Today’s Bay: Leveraging Next-Generation Models to Maximize and Manage Ecosystem Services
  15. Kenneth Rose, Mark Monaco, Thomas Ihde, Eric Smith, Jay Stauffer, Kirk Havens, Lee McDonnell, Lewis Linker, Kaylyn Gootman, Bruce Vogt, Marjorie Friedrichs, Mary Fabrizio, Colin Hawes, Dante Horemans: CESR: moving forward with assessing living resource responses for prioritizing projects and restoration plan formulation