[Coral-List] More shameless advertizing

[Dennis Hubbard]

Hi all:

As I have read with interest all the great session descriptions for the
upcoming Reef symposium, I thought I'd add ours to the list. This session
is a melding of two submissions related to sea level, reefs and island
building. The following is my attempt at combining the two proposal
narratives. Our joint goal in this session is to look at complex
relationships between climate change, sea-level rise, reef (physical) and
reef-community structure, and reef building in the past to better
understand the fate of reefs and reef islands moving forward. We hope to
look at this from a variety of perspectives that will help us tie reef
communities to the structures they create and occupy, to better understand
connections between reef and reef-island building on a geologic scale,
island colonization on an historical timescale and the fate if island
communities going forward. Hopefully, all of this will encourage
connections between scientific and management perspectives and lead to
meaningful discussions of what we should be measuring as we try to create
meaningful connections among different disciplinary views of the reef and
reef-island system. The session title, organizers and my attempt at a
combination of the two original session proposals follows. We hope to
organize a discussion session to consider what we should be thinking about
moving forward. There are several other sessions that have themes that
might contribute to this discussion and we hope we can use this forum to
widen participation even further. If you have any questions or suggestions,
pleas contact one of the organizers.

Dennis
35 - Rising sea level and the responses of reefs and reef islands
Dennis K. Hubbard , Oberlin College dhubbard at oberlin.edu
<dhubbard at oberlin.edu?cc=kayanne at eps.s.u-tokyo.ac.jp,C.Perry at exeter.ac.uk,p.kench at auckland.ac.nz,gischler at em.uni-frankfurt.de>

Hajime Kayanne , University of Tokyo kayanne at eps.s.u-tokyo.ac.jp
<kayanne at eps.s.u-tokyo.ac.jp?cc=dhubbard at oberlin.edu,C.Perry at exeter.ac.uk,p.kench at auckland.ac.nz,gischler at em.uni-frankfurt.de>

Chris Perry , Univ. of Exeter C.Perry at exeter.ac.uk
<C.Perry at exeter.ac.uk?cc=dhubbard at oberlin.edu,kayanne at eps.s.u-tokyo.ac.jp,p.kench at auckland.ac.nz,gischler at em.uni-frankfurt.de>

Paul S. Kench , University of Auckland p.kench at auckland.ac.nz
<p.kench at auckland.ac.nz?cc=dhubbard at oberlin.edu,kayanne at eps.s.u-tokyo.ac.jp,C.Perry at exeter.ac.uk,gischler at em.uni-frankfurt.de>

Eberhard Gischler , Goethe-Universitaet gischler at em.uni-frankfurt.de
<gischler at em.uni-frankfurt.de?cc=dhubbard at oberlin.edu,kayanne at eps.s.u-tokyo.ac.jp,C.Perry at exeter.ac.uk,p.kench at auckland.ac.nz>

*Sea level has been an important factor in reef building in the geologic
past and is at the center of discussions about the fate of reefs and reef
islands in the 21st century. The complexity of the reef structure is
dependent on the diversity of its community, but those organisms rely on
the spatial heterogeneity provided by the edifice where they reside. The
link with reef islands is even more complex as bioerosion that reduces reef
structure also provides the sediment for island building. As reefs respond
to lower calcification, warming temperatures, rising acidification and
stronger storms, it will be increasingly difficult to maintain their
present rate of vertical accretion. At the same time, sea-level rise
continues to accelerate and it is likely that beach erosion and flooding
will increase at disproportionate rates, owing to a loss of protection,
increasing storminess and perhaps wholesale sediment export from shallow
carbonate platforms. The combined perspectives of biologists, geologists,
anthropologists, oceanographers, modelers, planners and others can provide
insights that are less obvious when viewed from a single discipline. A
better understanding of the individual and combined roles of carbonate
production, bioerosion and sediment redistribution will provide a more
complete understanding of reef building in the Quaternary as well as better
ways to predict and monitor the fate of reefs and the islands that depend
on them in the 21st century. This session encourages contributions from a
wide variety of practitioners, including natural scientists, sociologists,
managers and planners so that we might consider the links between sea-level
rise, reef construction, island building and the fate of those that live
near the world's coral reefs and the reef islands that depend on them.*

-- 
Dennis Hubbard
Chair, Dept of Geology-Oberlin College Oberlin OH 44074
(440) 775-8346

* "When you get on the wrong train.... every stop is the wrong stop"*
 Benjamin Stein: "*Ludes, A Ballad of the Drug and the Dream*"