Where I Work: Coral Reef Ecology

Environmental & Science Education, STEM, Nature of Science, History of Science, Biodiversity, Nature, Wildlife, Earth & Space Sciences, Earth Systems

Ed Hessler

The journal Nature's Where I Work features coral reef ecologist Henri Vallois who works in the Caribbean where he is a faculty member of the University of the West Indies.

Science writer Linda Nordling describes his work, "We monitor the abundance and diversity of corals, algae, sponges and fish. Barbados no longer has populations of large fish, such as groupers and snappers, because of overfishing. The populations of parrotfish, Barbados’s most important species ecologically and economically, have seemed stable for the past decade.

"Reefs are under threat globally, and the biggest losses of corals here occurred in the 1970s and 1980s. Since the 1990s, the shallow reefs have stabilized, but the deeper reefs have continued to deteriorate."

By now you know that these are short reads - ~ 3 m - about the variety of scientific careers  which sometimes includes, as this one does, where the early interest of a young boy led. 

So please read it to learn a little more about his career.