Estuaries are critical natural environments to many marine species, so ensuring these ‘nurseries’ thrive is essential to environmental health and many local economies. Due to ongoing climate change, estuary temperatures are warming, which could negatively impact these habitats. Most estuaries, however, lack surface water temperature data, which is needed to study the sensitivity of these systems to warming water temperatures. To that end, a team of scientists at UMCES and the University of Pittsburgh developed a database for 1,060 estuaries around the world. Photo courtesy of NOAA.
