John Parkinson

Marine heat wave caused key part of Florida's coral reef to become "functionally extinct," report says A record 2023 heat wave all but eradicated two species of coral that historically served as the backbone of Florida's reefs, researchers said in a new report.

Some additional coverage of our report on the major loss of acroporid corals in the Florida Keys by @cbsnews.com:

www.cbsnews.com/news/florida...

Heat-driven functional extinction of Caribbean Acropora corals from Florida’s Coral Reef In 2023, a record-setting marine heat wave triggered the ninth mass coral bleaching event on Florida’s Coral Reef (FCR). We examined spatial patterns of heat exposure along the ~560-kilometer length o...

Results I'm sad to share but must be told - branching coral are now functionally extinct in Florida - to learn more check out the full study www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... and our personal summary theconversation.com/2-iconic-cor...

A global coral phylogeny reveals resilience and vulnerability through deep time - Nature The most recent common ancestor of the stony coral Scleractinia dates to about 460 million years ago and was probably a solitary, heterotrophic and free-living organism.

This is an INCREDIBLE advance in our understanding of coral diversification. 🪸🎉 Fantastic new work led by @claudiavaga.bsky.social

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

In the Parkinson Lab at USF, saving Florida's Coral Reef is a top priority University of South Florida

USF media produced a nice article about our lab!

Many thanks to those who put it together, and of course to my students who make the research possible.

www.usf.edu/arts-science...

Proactive assisted gene flow for Caribbean corals in an era of rapid coral reef decline Regulatory action could facilitate cross-border efforts to retain ecosystem function

Proactive assisted gene flow for Caribbean corals in an era of rapid coral reef decline | Science www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Stoke to announce that I will be joining the Department of Biology @txst.edu this coming Fall semester as an Assistant Professor!

Looking for grad students with interests in #Symbiodiniaceae, #corals 🪸, microbial #symbiosis 🦠, comparative #genomics 🧬 and #phylogenomics soon. Feel free to reach out!

After months of official silence, mass mortality of corals in Western Australia - since January - is finally getting attention. www.watoday.com.au/national/wes...

Our "Guide to communicating microbiomes in the media", created in collaboration @lindsaybroadbent.bsky.social aims to help navigate the complexities of communicating microbiome research. Click the link in our bio to read and download the guide.

Change is coming to microbiology publishing. A new space for authoritative reviews and forward-looking perspectives is on the horizon. Be the first to hear the full announcement at #Microbio25.

Congrats to Parkinson lab PhD students Lauren & Matt (and former postdoc Raul!) and the whole team for putting together this nice perspective on efforts to incorporate microbiome analyses into conservation efforts.

Florida elkhorn corals need active genetic help to handle climate change, they cannot do it on their own. The risk is far less than the risk of doing nothing. 🌏🧪https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.14920439 @coralconsortium.bsky.social

Congrats to Peter Fisichella for presenting his undergraduate research on #Symbiodiniaceae thermal tolerance this weekend at the #Florida Undergraduate Research Conference! (hosted this year in Tampa @ USF) @usouthflorida.bsky.social hflorida.bsky.social

YouTube video by Universal Pictures Jurassic World Rebirth | Official Trailer

I don't come on social media often anymore, but I can't resist when there's a new #JurassicPark trailer to share.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=jan5...

PSA: pre-print of Symbiodiniaceae chapter for the upcoming coral microbiome book; was super fun to write w/ @parkinsonje.bsky.social & Raquel Peixoto; I find this very accessible & hopefully fun to read, have a look & stay tuned for the upcoming book doi.org/10.31219/osf... @unikonstanz.bsky.social

A very helpful guide!

Caribbean Acropora genomes/maps now available. Congrats @ibaums.bsky.social et al.!

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

I will second this! My interaction with Jon for a science story was fantastic.

Reading: Novel plastid genome characteristics in Fugacium kawagutii and the trend of accelerated evolution of plastid proteins in dinoflagellates doi.org/10.1093/gbe/...

Openly available illustrations as tools to describe eukaryotic microbial diversity The microbial world is diverse and critically important to understanding evolution and global ecology, but we lack teaching and communications resources. This Essay provides a series of technical diag...

Great artwork! (and tools) journals.plos.org/plosbiology/...

The Cassiosomes of Cassiopea- stinging cell structures fueled by algal symbionts.

Take a deep dive into the world of cassiosomes and their photosymbionts with @gaelletoullec.bsky.social’s first PhD paper. These autonomous cell structures of rhizostome jellyfish could be exciting model systems to study cnidarian symbioses! 🧫🪸🔬 doi.org/10.1128/msph... @cpogoreutz.bsky.social

We're hiring!

The University of South Florida, Tampa is searching for a Marine/Coastal Biologist (assistant professor / tenure track). Come join a great department!

Details: bit.ly/usf_marine_bio_search

Pic courtesy of NOAA/Allyson DeMerlis

Hot off the presses at Global Change Bio - Yingqi Zhang's 3rd chapter - Performance of Orbicella faveolata larval cohorts does not align with previously observed thermal tolerance of adult source populations
doi.org/10.1111/gcb....

Come help us with an expansive coral GWAS! Cool data, great team, and I hear Los Angeles is fun.