Coral Reefs and Climate Change: a Wheeler-Elliott Lecture in Oceanography by Dr. Isaiah Bolden '15

Modern coral reefs provide countless ecosystem services to coastal and global populations. However, numerous threats (i.e. sea surface warming, ocean acidification, pollution, dredging, etc.) are contributing to the decline away from coral dominance in these dynamic environments on a global scale. In this lecture, Dr. Bolden will discuss current and introduce novel forensic biogeochemical “clues” for fingerprinting and tracking the health of modern reefs in the context of this global decline; I will also discuss how similar “clues” from ancient and fossilized reef ecosystems could be coupled with studies of tropical cave environments to gain a more comprehensive marine and terrestrial perspective of changes in coastal ecosystem health and climate.

Dr. Isaiah Bolden is an oceanographer and biogeochemist who joined the faculty at Georgia Tech in Fall 2022. Despite growing up in landlocked Nashville, Tennessee, he’s found a way to have a coastal-focused career. His research is primarily aimed at understanding the health and impacts of climate change on modern and ancient coral reef ecosystems and other coastal environments. Dr. Bolden accomplishes this by designing and monitoring novel chemical proxies (or “clues”) that can be used to fingerprint changes in the community structure of these environments as a function of time and compounding stressors (like global warming and ocean acidification). He also is committed to community-engaged environmental research projects that promote community resilience and increase educational accessibility and diversity in the geosciences. He holds a BA in Earth in Oceanographic Science from Bowdoin College and an MS and PhD in Oceanography from the University of Washington.

 

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