| Summary: | This article is the first of two papers on the remotesensing methods of monitoring the Baltic ecosystem, developedby our team. Earlier, we had produced a series of detailed mathematicalmodels and statistical regularities describing the transportof solar radiation in the atmosphere-sea system, the absorptionof this radiation in the water and its utilisation in a varietyof processes, most importantly in the photosynthesis occurringin phytoplankton cells, as a source of energy for the functioningof marine ecosystems. The comprehensive DESAMBEM algorithm, presentedin this paper, is a synthesis of these models and regularities.This algorithm enables the abiotic properties of the environmentas well as the state and the functioning of the Baltic ecosystemto be assessed on the basis of available satellite data. It canbe used to determine directly a good number of these properties:the sea surface temperature, the natural irradiance of the seasurface, the spectral and spatial distributions of solar radiationenergy in the water, the surface concentrations and verticaldistributions of chlorophyll~{it a} and other phytoplanktonpigments in this sea, the radiation energy absorbed by phytoplankton,the quantum efficiency of photosynthesis and the primary productionof organic matter. On the basis of these directly determinedproperties, other characteristics of processes taking place inthe Baltic ecosystem can be estimated indirectly. Part 1 of this series of articles deals with the detailedmathematical apparatus of the DESAMBEM algorithm. Part 2 willdiscuss its practical applicability in the satellite monitoringof the sea and will provide an assessment of the accuracy ofsuch remote sensing methods in the monitoring of the Baltic ecosystem(see Darecki et~al. 2008 -- this issue).
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