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CCRU research projects
Temperate Coasts
Projects include:
- Flooding and Environmental Challenges for Venice and its Lagoon: State of Knowledge 2003
- The Big Flood: North Sea Storm Surges
- Monitoring of foreshore recharge for restoration of intertidal profiles and flood defence management: Shotley Point mud placement
- Wave Attenuation over Salt Marsh Surfaces
- Wave/Tide Monitoring
- Shoreline Management Plans
- Marsh surface sedimentation and elevation changes
- Remote sensing applications in the coastal zone
- Coastal Settlements at Risk
Tropical Coasts
The 1990s have been characterised by a growing interest in the assessment of coral reef condition and the threats, both natural and anthropogenic, that reefs face now and in the near-future. One process of particular concern has been the phenomenon of 'coral bleaching'. This term is used to describe the whitening of corals which results from the degeneration and/or loss of symbiotic algae, the zooxanthellae, and/or the loss of cells containing zooxanthellae, from coral tissues. Elevated sea surface temperatures and high solar irradiance at UV wavelengths, by overcoming coral photo-protective mechanisms, play a key role in driving coral bleaching processes. Within the last decade, the mapping of remotely-sensed SST 'hotspots' has confirmed the importance of large-scale, El Nino Southern Oscillation (ENSO) -related heating, cooling and migrations of ocean water masses as a prime determinant of widespread, mass coral bleaching episodes.
Projects include:
- Cambridge Coastal Research Unit and Khaled Bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation to assess tsunami impact on Western Indian Ocean coral reefs ...
- Reconstructing sea-level change from coral micro-atolls, Tongareva (Penhryn) Atoll, Northern Cook Islands
- Southern Seychelles Atoll Research Programme
- Shoals of Capricorn Marine Programme
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