Public Lecture Series
The UWA Oceans Institute brings together the University’s multidisciplinary research strengths across areas including oceanography, ecology, engineering, resource management and governance to help generate solutions towards the sustainable use of ocean resources.
Our OI Public Lecture Series is aimed at informing the public about some of the most pressing scientific challenges and sharing research undertaken at the Institute.
The fourth of our Oceans Institute Public Lectures for 2024.
Professor Steve Swearer discusses the current global challenges of halting and reversing declines in biodiversity through the restoration of marine ecosystems. He shares some of the current habitat restoration projects being undertaken in Australia, and why more creative thinking is needed in how we undertake restoration and measure outcomes.
Speaker: Professor Steve Swearer, Jock Clough Marine Foundation Oceans Chair.
The third of our Oceans Institute Public Lectures for 2024.
Professor Graeme Cumming discuses the science of collapse and the social-ecological dynamics that are driving global change in marine ecosystems. He will consider some of the big questions of our time: Are coral reefs on the verge of extinction? Will human societies collapse? And why have anthropologists so trashed Jared Diamond’s pet hypothesis?
The answers hinge on our limited understanding of complex systems and questions of scale. Despite the challenges we face, we still have the potential for great success or extreme failure, and this presentation will remain hopeful in the light of new advances and solutions.
Speaker: Professor Graeme Cumming, Premier’s Science Fellow.
The second of our Oceans Institute Public Lectures for 2024.
The global Nature Positive target to achieve a net gain in nature by 2030 is an urgent call to arms for both public and private sectors to take unprecedented, impactful action to address the catastrophic loss of biodiversity and ecosystem services.
To enable progress towards these targets, it is critical that nature finance is rapidly and sustainably scaled. To do this, we need to fully account for nature in strategy, economic, investment and risk management decisions, recognising that nature is an asset to be protected rather than exploited. Central to this is the need to ensure the integrity, transparency, and governance of nature-positive claims in the market which are underpinned by good quality data and standards.
Speaker: Dr Rachael Marshall, Accounting for Nature.
The first of our Oceans Institute Public Lectures for 2024.
There is now clear evidence that during the last decade global temperatures exceeded the 1.5oC guardrail and are on track to pass the critical 2 degrees threshold in the next few years. This seminar focuses on new evidence presented in the journal Nature Climate Change, looking at long-living Sclerosponges. These carbonate skeleton producing species can provide a ‘diary’ of sea temperatures going back over 300 years. The extraordinary warming that occurred in 2023 made it the hottest year on record. When coupled with this new research, a very different picture of global warming emerges.
Speaker: Professor Malcolm McCulloch