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Updated: Jul 18, 2025

Measuring the Structure, Composition, and Change of Underwater Environments with Large-area Imaging
Published on: April 18, 2025
Atolls of the world: A reappraisal from an optical remote sensing and global mapping perspective
1IRD, UMR-9220 ENTROPIE (Institut de Recherche pour le Développement, Université de la Réunion, IFREMER, CNRS, Université de la Nouvelle-Calédonie), BP 49 Vairao, Tahiti, French Polynesia.
Abstract:
The Millennium Coral Reef Mapping Project (MCRMP) aimed to map coral reefs worldwide at geomorphological thematic scales using Landsat satellite images at 30 m spatial resolution. The 5-level hierarchical classification scheme implemented by MCRMP identified at Level 2 'Atolls' as one of the main types of coral reef complexes. In this review, the qualitative criteria used by MCRMP to identify atolls are presented. Then, we report on the global census of atolls, from which a consistent geomorphologic GIS database is provided. A total of 598 atolls are identified and mapped. The quantitative database provides surface areas for all geomorphologic units at Level 4 and 5 of the MCRMP classification scheme. It allows further work on atoll and coral reef classifications, regionally and globally, in order to identify geomorphic trends and outliers. It is also a convenient database to use in multivariate analyses with ancillary biodiversity, fishery, socio-economic or climate data.
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