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HERO ID
7720037
Reference Type
Book/Book Chapter
Title
Climate variability and change: Monitoring data and evidence for increased coral bleaching stress
Author(s)
Eakin, CM; Lough, JM; Heron, SF; Liu, G
Year
2018
Publisher
Springer
Location
Cham, Switzerland
Book Title
Coral Bleaching: Patterns, Processes, Causes and Consequences
Page Numbers
51-84
Language
English
DOI
10.1007/978-3-319-75393-5_4
Web of Science Id
WOS:000461111100004
Relationship(s)
has other version or edition
8534847
Chapter 4:
Abstract
Coral reefs live within a fairly narrow envelope of environmental conditions constrained by water temperatures, light, salinity, nutrients, bathymetry, and the aragonite saturation state of seawater. While many environmental extremes can cause coral to expel their symbiotic microalgae and bleach on local scales, only elevated ocean temperature has been shown to cause the widespread “mass” bleaching spanning hundreds of kilometers or more. Corals have, over millions of years, evolved strategies to cope with temperature extremes, but anthropogenic climate change has been increasing temperature much faster than corals have been able to adapt. As mass bleaching has increased in frequency and severity, the connection to unusually warm ocean temperature has become clear, and modeling shows that this will increase in the future as atmospheric carbon dioxide continues to rise. This chapter focuses on records of these rising ocean temperatures that are responsible for basin- to global-scale coral bleaching events. We use long-term climatic datasets over the last 146 years and satellite records since the 1980s to document temperature and heat stress changes near coral reefs and the influence of large-scale climate patterns such as the El Niño-Southern Oscillation. Since the 1980s, satellite-based observations of the oceans have dramatically increased our capability to observe ocean variations globally and synoptically and provide the basis for identifying recent changes in heat stress and patterns of coral bleaching. Furthermore, the latest advances in satellite-based sea surface temperature analysis and other products provide unprecedented means to detect and monitor, in near real time, environmental conditions related to coral bleaching events.
Editor(s)
van Oppen; MJH; Lough, JM
Series
Ecological Studies, volume 233
ISBN
9783319753928
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