Oceanography | Vol. 38, No. 2
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(https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/products/passive-acoustic-data),
and all processed data products are accessible through the
ADEON Data Portal (https://adeon.unh.edu/data_portal).
SIGNIFICANT CONTRIBUTIONS
The overarching goal of ADEON was to establish an integrated,
deep-water acoustical observing system for the US Mid- and
South Atlantic OCS that generated year-round measurements of
the natural and human factors driving the regional ecology and
soundscape over several years and that are transferable to other
locations. To meet this goal, the program generated new tech
nology, infrastructure, measurement, and analysis approaches
that have since been applied to other regions. The ADEON effort
went beyond data collection and analyses related to monitor
ing ecosystem components to perform basic science and pub
licly disseminate the data to support future research. Science
and innovation accomplishments of ADEON include (1) devel
opment and implementation of standardized acoustic metrics
and practices across ADEON components that are serving as
a model for national and international soundscape programs,
(2) development of an Autonomous Long-Term Observation
(ALTO) lander that simultaneously records acoustic (passive
and active) and oceanographic information, (3) identification
of the horizontal range of extrapolation for acoustic backscat
ter point samples recorded at each lander location for guiding
future monitoring designs (Blair et al., 2021), (4) documenta
tion of minke whale winter mating grounds in the southern
and offshore waters of the Blake Plateau (Kowarski et al., 2022),
(5) determination of site fidelity of beaked whale species along
the southeastern US OCS (Kowarski et al., 2022), (6) model-data
comparison of combined wind and vessel soundscape model
levels (Heaney et al., 2024), (7) modeling of regional ecology to
predict potential influences of long-term change on marine eco
systems, and (8) development of web-based tools to access and
visualize multi-dimensional data streams.
The ADEON team established a long-term (three-year)
observing network that provided the first publicly avail
able, multi-location (seven sites), wide-band (10–7,000 Hz),
FIGURE 1. (a) Data was collected for the Atlantic Deepwater Ecosystem Observatory Network (ADEON) using fixed and mobile platforms, shipboard
sampling, and satellite remote sensing. (b) Schematic of the Autonomous Long-Term Observatory (ALTO) landers used in ADEON. Hydrophones were
spaced between 0.45 m and 0.68 m. (c) ADEON sites overlayed with bathymetry. Standard landers had a passive acoustic system and oceanographic
sensors. The Standard with the Acoustic Zooplankton Fish Profiler (AZFP, ASL Environmental Sciences, Canada) landers had the addition of an echo
sounder system. (d) ADEON sites ordered from north to south.