News: School of Biological Sciences

Changes in marine ecosystems going undetected

Existing ways of calculating biodiversity dynamics are not very effective in detecting wholesale species community change due to the effects of ocean acidification.

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Study finds famous Australian caves are up to 500,000 years older than we thought - and it could help explain a megafauna mystery

South Australia’s Naracoorte Caves is one of the world’s best fossil sites, containing a record spanning more than half a million years. Among the remains preserved in layers of sand are the bones of many iconic Australian megafauna species that became extinct between 48,000 and 37,000 years ago.

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We helped fill a major climate change knowledge gap, thanks to 130,000-year-old sediment in Sydney lakes

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Invasion Science & Wildlife Ecology Group accolades at the Centre for Invasive Species Solutions 'Balanced Research Program'.

Congratulations to Dr Pablo Garcia Diaz, Adam Toomes and Katherine Hill who were acknowledged at last Friday's Centre for Invasive Species Solutions 'Balanced Research Program' celebrations in the Australian Academy of Science's Shine Dome in Canberra.

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Tropical and desert grasses may migrate further south

The maximum summer temperature and the amount of rainfall in summer are the two climate factors that determine the type of native grass that grows in a region, Australian researchers have found in a recent study.

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Regenerating Australia screening and Dynamic Statement release event

Last Wednesday evening the University's Ecoversity and Environment Institute partnered to host the screening of Regenerating Australia, as part of Sustainability Week 2022.

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Once the fish factories and ‘kidneys’ of colder seas, Australia’s decimated shellfish reefs are coming back

Australia once had vast oyster and mussel reefs, which anchored marine ecosystems and provided a key food source for coastal First Nations people. But after colonisation, Europeans harvested them for their meat and shells and pushed oyster and mussel reefs almost to extinction. Because the damage was done early – and largely underwater – the destruction of these reefs was all but forgotten.

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EVENT: Rewilding the oceans: combining marine biology & technology, public & policy

The Environment Institute is pleased to present an engaging panel discussion on rewilding our oceans for the University of Adelaide's Ecoversity 2022 Sustainability Week.

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Fishing for Data on Plastics

The problem of plastics in our oceans and their potential impact on people, plants, animals and entire ecosystems was front and centre at the recent United Nations Ocean Conference in Portugal.

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Ocean warming threatens richest marine biodiversity

An international team of scientists led by researchers from the University of Adelaide has revealed that rates of future warming threaten marine life in more than 70 per cent of the most biodiverse-rich areas of Earth’s oceans.

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