Hi All, the ongoing bleaching of the Great Barrier Reef has once again been stimulating some interesting discussions in parliament.

A couple of weeks ago I was surprised to find out that that some of our teams research using fossil reef cores from One Tree Reef investigating the millennial scale response of the reef to sea level rise and other environmental factors was quoted directly in parliament to support claims about the current bleaching. Check out the link below from the AAP which describes these claims and then responses from myself and other colleagues working on different aspects of coral reef systems. It makes for some interesting weekend reading.

Experts say senator’s reef bleaching claims are nonsense

It certainly makes for a fantastic teaching exercise for our students to think critically about claims made in the media, parliament or elsewhere.

Cheers

Jody

#MarineScienceSydneyUni