E-mail Announcements

Subject: Session 9 - 6th European Coral Reef Conference

Dear colleagues,

We would like to draw your attention and invite submission of abstracts to the thematic session (number 9):

Long-term large-scale observations of changes in reef communities II:
- Ecological effects of ocean acidification and bleaching
- Remote sensing and macroecological approaches to monitoring

to be held at the 6th European Coral Reef Conference 2006
European Meeting of the International Society for Reef Studies (ISRS)
19-22 September 2006 in Bremen, Germany.

Any efforts to preserve, protect and manage coral reefs need of reliable programs for quantitatively monitoring, mapping and assessing the dynamics of community distribution. This allows the investigation of environmental stressor-response relationships and provides the capability to efficiently screen and predict the current and future health of these biodiversity rich ecosystems. In this session, we wish to invite contributions covering a wide range of questions and scales. First, we aim at focusing on the emerging environmental problem of ocean acidification, both from an observational point of view, with actual instrumental measurements or proxy-derived trends in reef-water pH and other parameters of the CO2 system in seawater and, on the other hand, from an ecological perspective of possible threats that future acidification will pose to coral communities. Any kind of experimental work addressed to unravel this issue will be most welcome as a contribution to this session. Second, we would also like to invite contributions focused in the ecological effects of disturbances (e.g., coral bleaching) from different approaches, experimental, theoretical and from long-term large-scale observations. Third, we intend to assess and demonstrate the effectiveness of being able to monitor coral reefs and their surrounding environment using remote sensing, a powerful scientific discipline that continues to improve through advances in detector technologies, the acquisition of spectral information on bottom features, increases in the spatial and spectral resolution of sensors, as well as by improved computer capabilities and analysis methods. We strongly encourage contributions on the use of these techniques, with examples of successful applications in the understanding of coral reef communities and their unique ecosystems.

If you are interested in participating in this session, please submit your abstract by May 15 at http://isrs2006.zmt.uni-bremen.de/regis.php . Click on 'Registration', go to 'Abstract Submission', and assign your abstract to session [9] "Long-term large-scale observations of changes in reef communities II". Please also forward copies of the abstract (indicating whether you would prefer an oral or poster presentation) to us at: yamano@noumea.ird.nc and pelejero@cmima.csic.es .

We look forward to your participation in this exciting meeting.

Hiroya Yamano and Carles Pelejero (Co-chairs of this session)

Hiroya Yamano
- Visiting Researcher at IRD -
UR 128 CoReUs, Institut de Recherche pour le Developpement
BP A5 98848 Noumea Cedex, New Caledonia
Tel: (687) 26 07 19
Fax: (687) 26 43 26
- Senior Researcher at NIES -
Center for Global Environmental Research
National Institute for Environmental Studies
16-2 Onogawa, Tsukuba, Ibaraki 305-8506, Japan
e-mail: yamano@noumea.ird.nc

Carles Pelejero
Institut de Ciències del Mar, CMIMA-CSIC
Pg. Marítim de la Barceloneta, 37-49
08003 Barcelona, Catalonia (Spain)
Tel: (34) 93 2309500 Ext: 1307
Fax: (34) 93 2309555
e-mail: pelejero@cmima.csic.es

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