Active chlorophyll a fluorescene measurements in the field can be rather complicated to interpret and sometimes we do not really know what we measure or how to measure it best.

That being said, great advances have been made in measurement capabilities of instruments, and, being an optical method, there is great potential to collect global, high-resolution, and inter-comparable data of phytoplankton physiology and photosynthetic activity.

Such large and consistent datasets would be invaluable for our understanding in trends and drivers of primary productivity in space and time and provide much needed input for development and validation of ecosystem models and remote sensing algorithms. 

Large datasets from a range of regions and seasons are further needed to validate and improve novel measurement capabilities, such as multi-spectral photochemical excitation spectra and dual waveband fluorescence emission measurements.

With a growing number of e.g. CT-LabSTAF instruments being deployed on board research vessels around the world, collecting large datasets of continous data while connected to the underway water supply, this community is an attempt to work together, pool our data, and turn it into something that is bigger than the sum of its parts. The aim is to work together, no datasets should be used in any way without involving their original owner in the analysis or publications.