Cara Wilson

Cara Wilson

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    NOAA Fisheries

    • Satellite Oceanographer with over 24 years of experience working with fisheries scientists and marine resource managers to increase the operational use of satellite data.

    Research Oceanographer at NOAA Fisheries

    Since 2002 I have worked as a satellite oceanographer for NOAA’s Southwest Fisheries Science Center in Monterey, CA. I have had a number of specific roles during my work with NOAA, including:

    • 2006-present: Principal Investigator (PI) for the West Coast Node of NOAA’s Coast Watch Program.

    • 2014-present: Principal Investigator (PI) for the PolarWatch Node of NOAA’s Coast Watch Program.

    • 2023-2025: Co-coordinator of the 7 Strategic Initiatives (SIs) that were established as part of the Essential Data Acquisition (EDA) subcomponent of IRA (Inflation Reduction Act) funding that NOAA received. The SIs received $48M in funding and as co-coordinator I helped the SIs develop and execute their work missions and funding plans.

    • 2020-present: Associate editor for the Journal of Geophysical Research-Oceans.

    • 2022 - 2003: Temporary Detail as the Satellite Coordinator for NOAA’s Fisheries Service. The objective of the detail was to establish the roadmap for a new position which was created to be the spokesperson for NOAA Fisheries satellite needs. Involved networking within all parts of NOAA Fisheries to understand their satellite requirements and articulating those needs to NOAA NESDIS (National Environmental Satellite Data Information Service) and NASA. Meeting the needs of fisheries scientists is especially important to establish advocacy for the planned GEO-XO satellite to demonstrate societal benefits.

    • 2017-2022: Chair of the International Ocean Colour Coordination Group (IOCCG). The IOCCG is an international committee of experts comprised of representatives from national space agencies and research scientists from the ocean colour community. After being asked to be on the IOCCG committee as a representative of the fisheries community I was subsequently asked to assume the position of IOCCG chair. The principal interaction occurs in via their annual meetings, and I chaired meeting in Rome Italy, Hanoi Vietnam and Frascati, Italy. IOCCG promotes development and applications of science and technology that underpin remote sensing of ocean colour through coordination, training, liaison between providers (space agencies) and users (scientists), advocacy, and provision of expert advice. I am currently serving a term as the “past chair”.

    • 2014-2020: Principal instructor for the trainings associated with the PORSEC (Pan-Oceanic Remote Sensing Conference). I helped organize and teach trainings in Bali, Indonesia (2014), Fortaleza, Brazil (2016), Jeju, S. Korea (2018) and Malaysia (2020, online).