METHODS article
Front. Mar. Sci.
Sec. Ocean Observation
Volume 12 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fmars.2025.1625587
This article is part of the Research TopicBest Practices in Ocean ObservingView all 87 articles
Optimized UVC-based Antifouling System for Moored Applications
Provisionally accepted
- 1Leibniz Institute for Baltic Sea Research (LG), Warnemünde, Germany
- 2Sea-Bird Scientific, Bellevue, WA, United States
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Biofouling, the unwanted accumulation of marine organisms on submerged structures, significantly compromises the quality of scientific data acquisition. A promising approach to mitigate biofouling on marine sensors is the use of UVC-based antifouling systems. However, existing systems often suffer from low efficiency, leading to high power consumption.This study presents a highly energy-efficient UVC-based antifouling system with a twentyfold increase in energy efficiency compared to previous commercial designs. The system was tested on moored CTDs and fluorometers in the southern Baltic Sea at a depth of 2 meters. Conductivity readings remained within the manufacturer’s specifications for 237 days, demonstrating the effectiveness of the approach in maintaining sensor performance.Based on in-situ measurements in coastal southern Baltic Sea water this study presents a formula to estimate UVC intensity in distances up to 50 cm in order to optimize the settings of UVC-based antifouling systems.
Keywords: Ultraviolet, Biofouling, Biocide-free strategies, Marine sensor data, Observatory, Baltic Sea, Attenuation (absorption) coefficient
Received: 09 May 2025; Accepted: 25 Jun 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Mars, Krebs, Bjoerner, Christopoulou and Zielinski. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Robert Mars, Leibniz Institute for Baltic Sea Research (LG), Warnemünde, Germany
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