Category News

The world’s coral reefs could face mass bleaching and erosion within the next few decades, according to an international team of scientists including those from Australia. Their findings, published this week in the scientific journal PNAS, have particular significance for Australia, which oversees the Great Barrier Reef (GBR), the world’s largest coral reef ecosystem and an enormously important drawcard for the nation’s tourism industry.

The scientists, including marine plant ecologist Guillermo Diaz-Pulido from the Griffith University in the Australian state of Queensland, noted in a related article in the Conversation that the GBR contributes about 6.4 billion Australian dollars (about 5 billion U.S. dollars) to the national economy.

Their study, based on the findings from 183 ree...

Numbers of two Mediterranean turtle species have risen in the last three decades – but in Cyprus the recoveries are happening at different rates, new research shows. Nest counts at 28 beaches show green turtle nests increased by 162% from 1993 to 2019, while loggerhead nests rose by 46%. The research team – from the University of Exeter, the Society for the Protection of Turtles (SPOT) and Eastern Mediterranean University – say the difference is probably due to higher death rates among loggerhead turtles of all ages.

Turtles in this region used to be hunted for meat and shells, but this is now banned throughout the Mediterranean. Coupled with conservation of nesting beaches, this has allowed populations to recover – but the scientists say better protection at sea is still required.

Reef sharks do not stick to the same area throughout their lifetime, but use different habitats when they mature. This is shown by research by Wageningen University & Research (WUR) in the Caribbean Netherlands on 2 species of reef sharks, that has been published in the journal Marine Ecology Progress Series. These findings have potential implications for effectively managing and protecting these endangered species.

Scientists have used cameras at 376 locations on reefs in the waters of Saba and St. Eustatius. It turns out that mainly juvenile nurse sharks and Caribbean reef sharks swim around there: young sharks that are not yet sexually mature. ‘We have hardly observed any adult sharks,’ says researcher Twan Stoffers...

In a makeshift saltwater nursery located on an offshore Singapore island, a vital scientific experiment is taking place involving corals and sea invertebrates – and Lego bricks.  

“We needed to create flat and stable surfaces for the animals to rest on,” explained Neo Mei Lin, a leading marine biologist and senior research fellow from the National University of Singapore’s Tropical Marine Science Institute. “Detachable Lego bricks proved very useful in helping us to hold corals and giant clams in place.”

This quirky and ingenious approach has benefited Neo and her colleague Jani Tanzil, a fellow marine scientist at the institute...

The 45ft carcass lay belly-up in the surf at Fort Funston beach, just south of San Francisco, drawing a small crowd of hikers and hang gliders. The stench lingered on the evening breeze as seabirds circled the animal, a juvenile fin whale. The whale was the fifth to wash ashore in the area this month. The other four were gray whales – giant cetaceans who migrate an astounding 11,000 miles each year from Alaska to Baja and back – all found on beaches near the city over a span of just eight days.

Each was a startling scene that raised immediate concerns for many observers. Whales are an important part of the ecosystem, often looked to as markers of ocean health, and their deaths can serve as indicators that something is amiss.

But scientists say the picture is more complicated...

Using experimental “cloud brightening” technology and introducing heat-tolerant corals could help slow the Great Barrier Reef’s climate change-fuelled decline by up to 20 years, Australian scientists said Thursday. The reef faces “precipitous declines” in coral cover over the next five decades due to “intense pressure” from climate change, a study published in the peer-reviewed journal Royal Society Open Science said.

Climate change is causing marine heatwaves, more intense cyclones and flooding—all of which are damaging the health of the reef.

“Coral reefs are some of the most climate-vulnerable ecosystems on Earth,” lead author Scott Condie told AFP.

“The model projections suggest that coral cover on the Great Barrier Reef could fall below 10 percent within 20 years.”

The world’s glaciers are melting at an accelerating rate, according to a comprehensive new study. A French-led team assessed the behaviour of nearly all documented ice streams on the planet. The researchers found them to have lost almost 270 billion tonnes of ice a year over the opening two decades of the 21st Century. The meltwater produced now accounts for about a fifth of global sea-level rise, the scientists tell Nature journal.

The numbers involved are quite hard to imagine, so team member Robert McNabb, from the universities of Ulster and Oslo, uses an analogy. 

“Over the last 20 years, we’ve seen that glaciers have lost about 267 gigatonnes (Gt) per year...

US President Joe Biden has told a major summit that we are in a “decisive decade” for tackling climate change.

The US has pledged to cut carbon emissions by 50-52% below 2005 levels by the year 2030. This new target, which was unveiled at a virtual summit of 40 global leaders, essentially doubles their previous promise. But the leaders of India and China, two of the world’s biggest emitters, made no new commitments.

“Scientists tell us that this is the decisive decade – this is the decade we must make decisions that will avoid the worst consequences of the climate crisis,” President Biden said at the summit’s opening address.

“We must try to keep the Earth’s temperature to an increase of 1.5C. The world beyond 1...

By all accounts they are a miracle of the underwater world. Reckoned to sequester carbon 35 times faster than a tropical rainforest, seagrass meadows also provide a haven for some of the most fantastical marine creatures on Earth – even in the UK, where enigmatic seahorses are among those found sheltering in the swaying blades. 

Yet the UK’s seagrass meadows have vanished at an astonishing rate. According to some estimates we have lost more than 90 per cent of them in the last century or so; pollution, dredging, bottom trawling and coastal developments have all contributed to their demise.   

Seeking to turn the tide for these imperilled ecosystems is a conservation initiative that is being billed as the largest seagrass restoration project in England.

Launching today and las...

You’re out for your daily walk. You see a face mask on the ground. Few want to touch what has shielded someone’s potentially virus-laden breath. So there it lies until it blows away—and that elemental problem is rapidly changing the landscape around the world, from grocery store parking lots to beaches on uninhabited islands. Vaccines we mastered in record time to combat COVID-19. Litter in the time of the pandemic, it turns out, frustratingly defies solution.

A year ago, the idea that disposable face masks, gloves, and wipes could become global environmental pollutants was not a pressing concern. Personal protective equipment, PPE for short, was seen as essential for preventing the spread of COVID-19. No one imagined just how much of it would be needed, for so long...