Coastal Oceans Research and Development in the Indian Ocean

The materials manipulation plays a key role in mathematics education by transforming abstract concepts into concrete experiences. This paper presents an exploratory qualitative study focused on how Pattern Blocks promote computational and geometric thinking in 25 first grade students from a Portuguese private school. Over five formative sessions, children participated in practical activities which echoed the national curriculum such as identifying, composing and decomposing shapes. Observations of classes, video recordings and document analysis were used to collect data. Both physical and digital Pattern Blocks facilitate mathematical learning by promoting spatial awareness, logical reasoning, pattern recognition, and problem-solving skills. The students developed their out-of-the-box and critical thinking, abstraction and collaboration. The study concludes that the integration of structured material promotes meaningful, student centered, active, and collaborative learning, while effectively developing computational and geometric thinking in early mathematics education.

Marine ecosystem restoration, particularly coral reef restoration, has gained popularity as a conservation intervention in tropical areas. Traditionally driven by natural science, these efforts often overlooked social aspects, such as the inclusion of relevant stakeholders. In Kenya, the co-management approach involving Beach Management Units (BMUs) has been adopted for sustainable marine resource management, fostering active and long-term coastal community participation. This paper investigates the drivers of engagement of various stakeholders, particularly understanding their motivations, capacities, and the associated challenges in engaging in coral reef restoration efforts in Shimoni, on the southern coast of Kenya. We employed marine stewardship as a framework and utilized qualitative research methodologies to collected data; eighteen semi-structured interviews with key respondents, two focus group discussions, participant observations during BMU’s meeting, and a review of secondary sources. Our results identified six stakeholder categories: local community represented under BMUs, national and county governments, non-governmental organisations (NGOs), funding agencies, knowledge and research institutions, and tourism businesses. Notably, the BMU and government agencies are central nodes in an extensive stakeholder network. Key motivations include a collective call to stewardship, sustainable reef management, and coral reef resilience research, while capacities vary in sense of ownership, legislative mandate, technical knowledge, and financial or supportive resources. Underlying challenges revolve around limited awareness, leadership and governance issues, project implementation, community engagement, resource mobilisation, and external threats. Understanding stakeholders, motivations, capacities and challenges is crucial for designing effective and inclusive reef restoration strategies, embedded in local societies.

Marine predators often function as sentinel species, the first organisms to be impacted when a habitat is disturbed, and directly contribute to ecosystem health by maintaining physical connections between distal habitats. Elasmobranch fishes (sharks and rays) are common predators in most aquatic systems, but over the past 50 years, elasmobranch abundance has dropped>70% from overfishing and climate change. Further, many populations throughout the world are known to be Data Deficient, confounding management decisions. To remedy this, we investigated patterns of genetic structure and diversity in two elasmobranchs from Sri Lanka, the tiger shark Galeocerdo cuvier, and the whipray Brevitrygon sp., using the mitochondrial genes ND2 and CO1. Our results showed low diversity and high connectivity in G. cuvier, with several haplotypes shared between sharks in Sri Lanka and other ocean basins. For Brevitrygon sp., our analyses confirmed this species to be Brevitrygon imbricata, a species previously found to have low genetic diversity. Taken together, these results indicate that elasmobranchs sampled from the fish markets of Sri Lanka are connected by gene flow to populations in other regions, suggesting that they may resist depletion better than more-isolated groups.

Abstract Countries have committed to conserving and restoring ecosystems after signing the Kunming‐Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF). The IUCN Red List of Ecosystems (RLE) will serve as a headline indicator to track countries' progress toward achieving this goal. Using Kenyan coral reefs, we demonstrate how nations implementing the GBF can use standardized estimates of ecosystem degradation from RLE assessments to support site‐specific management decisions. We undertook a reef‐by‐reef analysis to evaluate the relative decline of four key ecosystem components over the past 50 years: hard corals, macroalgae, parrotfish, and groupers. Using the two benthic indicators, we also calculated standardized estimates of state to identify reef sites which maintain a better condition through time relative to adjacent sites. Kenya's coral reefs have degraded across all four ecosystem components. At more than half the monitored sites parrotfish and grouper abundance declined by more than 50%, while coral cover and macroalgae‐coral ratio declined by at least 30%. This resulted in an Endangered threat status for coral reefs in Kenya (under criterion D of the RLE). The results can guide management actions related to 9 of the 23 GBF targets. For example, we identified several sites with relatively healthy benthic and fish communities as candidate areas for protection measures under Target 3. The RLE has a key role to play in monitoring and meeting the goals and targets of the GBF, and our work demonstrates how using the wealth of data within these assessments can inform local‐scale ecosystem management and amplify the GBF's impact.

<strong class="journal-contentHeaderColor">Abstract.</strong> This review of recent advances in biosphere research aims to provide information on selected issues related to changes in biodiversity, ecosystem functioning, social and economic interactions with ecosystems, and the impacts of climate change on the biosphere. We highlight advances on nine themes that have been recently published in peer-reviewed journals that are gaining importance in the scientific community and have the potential to guide future actions as well as inspire future research questions. Our focus is on the interactions between climate, biosphere and society, and on strategies to sustain, restore or promote ecosystems and their services. While mitigating climate change is expected to reduce many risks and associated costs, rapid emission reductions are also crucial to secure various co-benefits of ecosystems, such as coastal protection or stabilization of regional hydrological cycles. In this context, conservation measures implemented in cooperation with local actors are key to efficient resource allocation. At the same time, holistic action frameworks at the global level are required to guide and support such efforts.

Abstract The persistence of diverse yet threatened ecosystems like coral reefs will require urgent action underpinned by effective assessments of resilience. Resilience potential assessments are commonly used to identify coral reefs likely to be more resilient to disturbances, based on indicators of state and function. Assessments are intended to support decision‐making, therefore, using principles from decision‐science and indicator design theory, we evaluated the selection, design and analysis of indicators from 68 resilience potential assessments conducted between 2008 and 2022. These principles include justifying and testing indicators and aggregation approaches, representing key parts of the ecosystem, considering uncertainty and meaningful normalisation of indicators. Although a broad range of indicators were typically evaluated, assessments rarely present structured processes to guide and justify indicator selection, such as selection criteria and conceptual models of ecosystem function. We also found that certain key ecosystem components that confer resilience were represented by indicators in almost all assessments, such as corals, herbivory, competition and reef structure. Other factors were rarely considered, such as abundance and diversity of key fish trophic groups other than herbivores, for example groupers and corallivores, other aspects of biodiversity and competitive interactions with corals. Reference points used to translate variables into resilience indicators were typically derived from the data, such as the highest indicator value of assessed sites. Ecologically meaningful thresholds, such as collapse or historic levels, were used less often as references. In most cases, indicators were not tested or validated against independent data, uncertainties were not presented, and there was a tendency to simplify results into composite indices to rank sites, without justifying aggregation methods. Despite resource constraints, most resilience potential assessments collect quantitative data that are useful for coral reef management. However, the shortcomings identified can make indicator interpretation difficult, limiting the capacity to predict the resilience of the system and support decisions. Implementation of robust approaches drawn from indicator design and selection theory can help strengthen resilience potential assessments of coral reefs and other ecosystems, ultimately improving the prospects of conservation.

Abstract. Climate tipping elements are large-scale subsystems of the Earth that may transgress critical thresholds (tipping points) under ongoing global warming, with substantial impacts on biosphere and human societies. Frequently studied examples of such tipping elements include the Greenland Ice Sheet, the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation, permafrost, monsoon systems, and the Amazon rainforest. While recent scientific efforts have improved our knowledge about individual tipping elements, the interactions between them are less well understood. Also, the potential of individual tipping events to induce additional tipping elsewhere, or stabilize other tipping elements is largely unknown. Here, we map out the current state of the literature on the interactions between climate tipping elements and review the influences between them. To do so, we gathered evidence from model simulations, observations and conceptual understanding, as well as archetypal examples of paleoclimate reconstructions where multi-component or spatially propagating transitions were potentially at play. Lastly, we identify crucial knowledge gaps in tipping element interactions and outline how future research could address those gaps.

How can ocean governance and science be made more equitable and effective? The majority of the world’s ocean-dependent people live in low to middle-income countries in the tropics (i.e., the ‘tropical majority’). Yet the ocean governance agenda is set largely on the basis of scientific knowledge, funding, and institutions from high-income nations in temperate zones. These externally driven approaches undermine the equity and effectiveness of current solutions and hinder leadership by the tropical majority, who are well positioned to activate evidence-based and context-specific solutions to ocean-sustainability challenges. Here, we draw together diverse perspectives from the tropics to propose four actions for transformational change that are grounded in perspectives, experiences, and knowledge from the tropics: 1. Center equity in ocean governance, 2. Reconnect people and the ocean, 3. Redefine ocean literacy, and 4. Decolonize ocean research. These actions are critical to ensuring a leading role for the tropical majority in maintaining thriving ocean societies and ecosystems.