Achievement

IGERT Associate Alvin Bonilla Rodriguez presented a poster titled, ‘Historic Reconstruction of Coral Bleaching in the Caribbean Region,’ at the 2009 Annual University of Kansas Graduate Research Competition. His poster focused on the history of mass coral bleaching events in the Caribbean. He traced the role of climate variability in several mass bleaching episodes in 1969, 1987, 1990, 1995, 1998, 2003 and 2005. His poster explored the significance of the development of geoscientific models of how coral bleaching may degrade or benefit coral reef ecosystems and the policy implications of managing coral reefs.