Online now: Keystone coral species population collapse after unprecedented heat stress

The 2023 marine heatwave was devastating for Caribbean reefs; in this study, we report full mortality of over 5,000 Acropora palmata colonies across a reef scale. What is worrisome is that nearly 70% of reef crests across the Caribbean faced equal or higher levels of stress doi.org/10.1016/j.is...

A beautifully written story about parrotfishes and coral reefs by @lisasgardiner.bsky.social

Nature research paper: Reduced Atlantic reef growth past 2 °C warming amplifies sea-level impacts go.nature.com/3VjkuWL

Coral reefs will stop growing and many will start to erode if global warming hits 2°C, according to a new study of 400 sites.

Over 70% of coral reefs in the tropical western Atlantic Ocean are projected to be in a state of erosion by 2040, increasing to nearly all reefs in 2100 if warming exceeds 2 °C above preindustrial levels, a study in Nature suggests. go.nature.com/48m9Y8F 🌊 🧪

Dispersal Ability Reduces Thermal Specialization and Prevents Climate‐Driven Extinctions in a Neotropical Rainforest buff.ly/nNuQFG7

www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... Published today in Science: “The pace of new interventions is outstripping the capacity to prevent unintended consequences - because governance systems are not yet in place.” Stop the cowboys before they do even more damage!

The global marine heatwaves of 2023 were unprecedented in their intensity, persistence, and scale, according to a new Science study. The findings provide insights into the region-specific drivers of these events, linking them to broader changes in the planet’s climate system. scim.ag/4lOzfwm

Heard of "Darwin's paradox"? It refers to Charles Darwin's observation that coral reefs are wildly productive despite occurring in nutrient-poor tropical oceans. Reefs are, so the story goes, oases in marine deserts 🏝️... Turns out that 2/3 of these assertions are very wrong... 🌐 🦑🧪 🧵⬇️

New research challenges the long-held belief that coral reefs are “oases” in marine deserts. While among the world’s most productive ecosystems, their existence in nutrient-deprived oceans is the exception rather than the rule. @gobyone.bsky.social @utmsi.bsky.social cns.utexas.edu/news/researc...

Coral restoration is a rapidly growing field; however, the scalability of interventions is often a limitation to reverse coral losses at meaningful scales. We address this issue by proposing a spatially explicit approximation to optimize the outplanting design at the reefscape scale bit.ly/4kiVxoH

BBC News - Attenborough at 99 delivers 'greatest message he's ever told' www.bbc.com/news/article...

1/6 Call for session proposals 16th International Coral Reef Symposium, 19–24th July 2026, Auckland, Aotearoa New Zealand. Session proposal deadline: Sunday 15th June 2025. Details and submission link at www.icrs2026.nz/call-for-ses...

According to data from Coral Reef Watch, the worst global bleaching event on record has now hit more than 80% of the planet’s reefs, prompting scientists to warn that we are in “uncharted territory.” Read more from @readfearn.bsky.social in @theguardian.com: www.theguardian.com/environment/... 🌍🧪

Science Feedback provides valuable context behind the headline. science.feedback.org/review/84-of... We need more contextualizing of clickbait stories. Often, as in this case, there is an important, albeit nuanced, story not easily summarized in a catchy headline. @sciencefeedback.bsky.social

More than 80% of the world’s reefs hit by bleaching after worst global event on record #Climate

“Major barriers include the small scale of restoration programs, high costs per hectare, and the …. vulnerability (of corals) to future heat stresses. phys.org/news/2025-04...

If we continue burning fossil fuels and warming the ocean, coral reefs will become a thing of the past.

"The fact that so many reef areas have been impacted ... suggests that ocean warming has reached a level where there is no longer any safe harbour." 🪸💔 www.theguardian.com/environment/...

Update on Trump’s savage anti-science agenda: “The White House is ready to ask Congress to eliminate NOAA’s climate research centers and cut hundreds of federal and academic climate scientists who track and study human-driven global warming.” www.science.org/content/arti...

🌊🌊🪸🪸 Ever wonder how a hurricane modifies the landscape structure of a coral reef? In this newly published study, we use high-resolution drone imagery to explore how the impact of disturbances modulates the spatial arrangement and distribution of Acropora palmate patches. doi.org/10.1007/s003...

SOBERING NEWS!!! Coral restoration projects failing: One-third ineffective and unlikely to scale, study finds phys.org/news/2025-04... #coralreefs #coralreefresearch #coralrestoration #reefrestoration #coral #conservation #coralgardening #habitatrestoration #climatechange #marinebiology

Reality check: coral restoration won’t save the world’s reefs A coral ‘rope’ nursery in the Maldives. Luca Saponari/University of Milan, CC BY-ND Corey J. A. Bradshaw, Flinders University; Clelia Mulà, The University of Western Australia, and Giovanni Strona, University of Helsinki Coral reefs are…

Some 1,900 leading researchers accused the Trump administration in an open letter on Monday of conducting a “wholesale assault on U.S. science” that could set back research by decades and that threatens the health and safety of Americans.

“If those who speak Spanish as their second language are included, then the U.S. is the second-largest Spanish-speaking country in the world after Mexico.” By ending Spanish-language communications, the White House ignores U.S. demographics: buff.ly/pTDH2iR

In this news story, we discuss the need to rethink the role parrotfish play as a tool for reef conservation and management ......🐟 🪸 🪸 🐟

Our last article on Vulnerability of benthic trait diversity across the Mediterranean Sea following mass mortality events is out in @NatureComms ! 🪸🌱🐚🌡️🌊 A thread 👇🧵 nature.com/articles/s41...

So grateful that we share the Planet with other species 🌍

One of the few remaining elkhorn corals in the Caribbean is standing the wave energy... 🌊🪸

Great Barrier Reef fish reveal that large-scale macroecological patterns have changed significantly 🐟🐠 We found that changes in latitudinal diversity gradient & rising species turnover were strongly correlated with shifts in coral composition Out now in Nature Comms www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Congrats @reefjav.bsky.social on a beast of a paper showing that coral composition, not cover, drives reef fish assemblage change over space & time. 28yrs of #AIMS data over entire #GBR www.nature.com/articles/s41... Not bad for 1st paper of PhD 🤯 @lec-reefs.bsky.social @nickajgraham.bsky.social

Video on why measures of effectiveness are often exaggerated and what can be done about it. Speed cameras are my example but discuss conservation. Applies to any policy or practice. eur03.safelinks.protection.outlook.com?url=https%3A...

A new study finds ants best humans at tests of collective intelligence. Learn more: scim.ag/4h2K0ID

Not that Google was ever good, but this cartoon is a good summary of now.

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/... 🧪🦑🌎🐠

🌿 How does competition for funding shape research? An interesting new paper reveals the economic, ethical, and epistemic costs of competitive research funding. Addressing this has important implications for our ability to fund bold innovative conservation science. 🔗 www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

Allee effects require corals to lie within a few metres of their neighbours to achieve successful fertilisation. doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2… open acces @gerardricardo.bsky.social

🚨New postdoc positions available: we are looking for 2 postdoctoral researchers to join a large, collaborative effort to document, describe, and investigate the biodiversity of tiny, cryptobenthic fishes in the Indo-Pacific 🤏🐠🧪. More details: fishandfunctions.com/join%F0%9F%9... Please repost 🦑🧪

This episode was so good that I listened to it thrice.

Newly published parrotfish research in @plos.bsky.social. We used the most extensive reef system in the Gulf of Mexico – Alacranes Reef- as a study model to show that parrotfish functions are strongly linked to habitat structure and composition. Link: doi.org/10.1371/jour...

New #GlobalSharkTrends study published in @science.org reveals #overfishing has more than halved shark & ray populations over the past 50-years causing widespread erosion of ecological function and exceptionally high extinction risk 👉Full article bit.ly/GlobalSharkTrends 🧵1/20

Scientists thought global warming would slow this year. It didn’t. Just in time to make it hard for climate change deniers. wapo.st/4eZ5PY0

BLUESKY MEGA-THREAD Altmetric is thrilled and also LITERALLY RELIEVED to officially announce: We are now tracking research attention as it happens on Bluesky! We have been picking up posts on the site since late Oct. Our team is on Bluesky all day answering questions. Let's get into it!

Scientists, academics, researchers: We’re excited to share that @altmetric.com is now tracking mentions of your research on Bluesky! 🧪

Scientists as political advocates "[...] as more and more scientists come under political attack, they are realizing that we cannot rely on nonscientists to be the primary advocates for the necessity, value, and power of scientific knowledge and methods." www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

📢New Paper Alert📢 on corals and climate change in Science Adaptation via natural selection could determine whether Acropora corals persist under expected levels of global warming Hyperlinks & explainer thread below ⬇️ (1/12)

Time for the @bsky.app community to see one of my favorite visualizations of climate change... "Shifting Distribution of Land Temperature Anomalies" by svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/5211/ ⚒️🧪

Here is a coral reef science starter pack! go.bsky.app/Qo5Gh2H