Stories of science from the Australian Rivers Institute
"As the frequency and severity of bushfires increase due to climate change, Australian biodiversity is facing significant threats. A range of strategies and policies are in place to manage the damage of fires on species and ecosystems, including the use of fire-fighting chemicals."
"Often during flood events, water from agricultural catchments will erode productive agricultural soils and carry large loads of sediment and nutrients to downstream estuaries and coastal areas. This can threaten the provision of safe drinking water for humans and the ecology of marine ecosystems, as well as sometimes necessitating costly sediment dredging and disposal operations."
"Our research, published today, paints a grim picture. We estimate that even under the most optimistic emissions scenarios, we’ll see dramatic reductions in coral reef growth globally. The good news is that 63% of all reefs in this emissions scenario will still be able to grow by 2100."
"Revegetating abandoned agricultural land is critical for maintaining sustainability and biodiversity within our farming landscapes. Our recent paper demonstrated the feasibility of a large-scale revegetation approach in one of Australia’s most iconic agricultural regions, the Murray-Darling Basin."
"By altering the environment, are humans tricking animals into making poor life choices?"
"There has been a lot of focus on the challenge of managing overfishing with the controversial new documentary Seaspiracy on Netflix. But the overfishing issue isn’t as simple as the picture that documentary paints," Dr Chris Brown.
By Andria Ostrowski Read Time: 504 words, about 3 minutes. Vegetated coastal wetlands including saltmarshes, mangrove forests and seagrass meadows store large amounts of carbon, protect shorelines from storms and erosion, support enormous biodiversity and improve water quality by filtering nutrients, contaminants and sediments. Despite their ecological and economic importance, increasing human settlement and development [...]
Author: PhD Alyssa Giffin Read Time: 872 words, about 6 minutes. Welcome to part one of the five-part Transition article series, the sequel to the Emergent series, that follows ARI’s Post-Doc Research Fellows as they navigate the next stage of their academic journey post-PhD. Take a journey with them and hear about some of the [...]
Rivers, lakes, and wetlands support extraordinary diversity. Such bodies of water host more species per square kilometre than forests or oceans. Yet they are losing this biodiversity two to three times faster than forests and oceans. Populations of freshwater animals, including river dolphins, sturgeon, beavers, crocodiles, and giant turtles, have already plummeted by 88%.
By Dr Michael Sievers and Dr Mahua Roy Chowdhury Read Time: 481 words about 3 minutes. Royal Bengal Tiger. Photo: Unknown. Despite historic clearing and an Endangered status, there are positive signs when it comes to one of the largest mangrove ecosystems in the world - The Indian Sundarbans. The Indian Sundarbans form part of [...]
