Feb 15, 2019 | COTS, Grants, Research
The Crown of Thorns Starfish (CoTS) invoke horror and wonder. They also spur important science. Horror and wonder CoTS (Acanthaster) are indigenous to the Great Barrier Reef. They eat coral. In “normal” periods there are relatively few adult CoTS to be found and... 
Feb 14, 2019 | COTS, Grants, Research
Recently-published research shows larval Crown of Thorns Starfish (CoTS) clone themselves. A larval CoTS can split, resulting in TWO larval CoTS, each having the capacity to become a fully fertile adult. It takes less than a second. One moment there is a single... 
Feb 8, 2019 | Archaeology, Research
Updated in June 2019 People visited and stayed on the island for thousands of years before Captain James Cook passed by in 1770 and called it ‘Lizard’. Dingaal Aboriginal traditional owners know it as Jiigurru (‘stingray’). They were there long before Egyptian,... 
Jan 15, 2019 | Ecology, Fellowships, Global change, Research
Deep-water seagrass is sequestering carbon, mitigating climate change. Photosynthetic marine plants (especially seagrasses, tidal marshes and mangroves) “eat” carbon dioxide and release the oxygen component. Their residual biomass becomes part of the sea floor... 
Dec 12, 2018 | Ecology, Fellowships, Global change
Research on coral goby species at Lizard Island shows the social structure of those that live as pairs is more resilient to habitat degradation caused by successive cyclones, as compared to those that live in groups of 3 or more. See Martin L Hing et al Repeated...Dec 12, 2018 | Grants, Plastic pollution, Research
Dr Frederieke Kroon and her colleagues from AIMS have published the first study confirming the presence of marine microdebris, including microplastics, in wild-caught fish on the Great Barrier Reef. They found microdebris items in the gastro-intestinal tracts...