A Career in Coral

from Minds & Hearts, August 2018

Rise of the Jellyfish

Joseph Pollock is the Coral Strategy Director for one of the world's largest and most successful conservation organisations, The Nature Conservancy.

His career as a microbiologist, ecologist and educator has been remarkable, spanning multiple continents, and various multinational projects.

His passion for marine ecosystem conservation has lead him to experience coral disease and resilience in extraordinary settings that few others are able to.

While Joe has held had an interest in marine biology from a very young age, his deepest insights into reef ecosystems were gained through collaborative research with Australian colleagues, whom he met during his 2010 Fulbright Postgraduate Scholarship.

This is Joe's Fulbright Story.

LIFE DOWN UNDER (The Sea)

**Joe's Fulbright Scholarship took him across the globe**
Credit - Google maps

After completing a Bachelor of Science at the University of Kentucky, aspiring marine biologist Joseph Pollock took a summer fellowship in Kaneʻohe Bay, off the coast of Oahu, Hawaii.

Immersed in the pristine waters of this tropical paradise, Joe learned about a variety of marine ecosystems, completed a small project on coral disease, and began kindling a passion for coral reef conservation.

“I was hooked. It’s a relevant problem - the value of coral reefs is indisputable and they’re dying because of bleaching and various diseases that are popping up more and more all around the world. If we can understand what is driving these diseases, we find a way to protect these valuable systems.”

For his Master’s, Joe looked around at potential programs that focussed on marine science, eventually enrolling in a two-year Marine Biology degree at the College of Charleston, South Carolina.

The program included a year of research following the coursework component. However, since none of the locally-available research opportunities aligned with Joe’s interest in coral health, he decided to look abroad.

While researching various marine science laboratories across the globe, Joe heard about two Australians who were recognised as world leaders in the study of coral disease - Professor Bette Willis from James Cook University (JCU) and Dr David Bourne, who was then at the Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS). Fascinated and inspired by the work they were doing, Joe decided to make contact, seeking opportunities to be involved in their research.

Dr Bourne saw the project as a natural fit.

“At that point, Bette and I collaborated extensively on coral disease projects -- I was based at AIMS and hence Joe’s interest in coral disease work and molecular and microbial approaches made for a natural project based at both JCU and AIMS.”

Professor Willis and Dr Bourne also encouraged Joe to apply for funding opportunities, including the Fulbright Scholarship. He applied and was successful, with the scholarship ultimately facilitating a collaborative research program involving the two Australians, as well as Dr Pamela Morris from the College of Charleston.

“The Fulbright Scholarship was perfect for my situation – it gave me the opportunity to keep doing my coursework at my college in Charleston, but have my research component in Australia where the worldleaders were doing their thing.” said Joe.

“The Fulbright also opened up a lot of doors – not only did it get me over to Australia, but it enabled me to connect with so many relevant networks, and opened my mind to the fact that people at high levels can be interested in work that’s happening on the ground.

"It was cool to be a Master’s student talking to the Prime Minister of a nation about the work I was doing in his country!”

For his Master’s program, Joe worked on detection methods for Vibrio coralliilyticus, a coral pathogen thought to cause some types of the devastating white syndrome group of diseases in coral. He was able to travel extensively around the country for various activities and networking, and visit the research stations on Orpheus Island, Heron Island, and Lizard Island for fieldwork.

**Joe collects samples from the Great Barrier Reef**

**Joe enjoying the beautiful Townsville sunrise**

**The 2012 Fulbright Scholar cohort, many Prime Ministers ago**

SCIENCE MEETS POLICY

Keen to maintain his momentum, Joe took the next step and enrolled in a PhD program at JCU the following year. Professor Willis and Dr Bourne, now his supervisors, were more than happy to invite him back to Australia to further the research he had begun during his Master’s.

“From our earliest exchanges, it was clear that Joe is committed, enthusiastic and bright, with drive and a vision for how he wants to shape his career. “ said Professor Willis.

“It was a pleasure to cosupervise his Master’s and PhD. Joe has an innate ability to recognise pertinent, topical questions and to direct his research towards addressing them.”

Joe used the time to expand on his Vibrio coralliilyticus detection tool, inserting a green fluorescent protein to the bacterial pathogen so that its spread could be easily traced using special lights.

He also undertook research on Cymo melanodactylus, the furry coral crab. Field observations of these crabs had led some scientists to suggest that the white lesions on coral could have been caused by predation rather than from white syndrome, as large clusters of the crabs had been observed feeding in areas of coral where the disease was most concentrated.

Joe set up some experiments on Lizard Island to test this theory, and what he found was fascinating – the crabs were not actually causing disease; their feeding behaviour was in fact debriding the coral lesions, slowing the progress of the disease three-fold.

Joe’s work was also starting to attract a lot of attention, and he began to think bigger, looking at large-scale drivers of coral health and disease. His research had started out looking at a single bacterium, but now his work expanded to look at diverse communities of bacteria composed of hundreds of thousands of microbes on dideased corals collected from all around Australia.

He ventured out to Western Australia to study the impact of an 18-month dredging project near Barrow Island, a previously pristine area off the Pilbara coast. The dredging involved the removal of seven million cubic metres of seabed to create a channel to accommodate ships for the Gorgon natural gas project.

Using satellite imagery, Joe and his team mapped the areas of coral covered by plumes of sediment released by the dredging process. By donning SCUBA tanks and investigating coral disease levels along this dredge plume exposure gradient, they found there was a direct link between coral disease and sediment.

“No one had definitively shown a link between dredging--and the sedimentation and turbidity associated with dredging--and coral disease.

"It makes intuitive sense; as you’re making the water cloudy and raining sediment down upon the seabed, it’s not surprising that coral wouldn’t love that, but this was the first study to actually demonstrate the link with disease in the field.”

This study came at a critical time. The Australian Government was considering expansive dredging within the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park, which had been controversially greenlighted by the Marine Park Authority. However, with this newfound link, Australian coral conservation organisations were able to fight back with tangible evidence.

The issue garnered a huge outcry and subsequent media attention. Dire headlines were splashed across major newspapers, and damning feature stories appeared in National Geographic and Four Corners.

Thanks to evidence provided by scientific studies such as Joe’s work on Barrow Island, the proposal was ultimately scrapped, and a ban on all dredging within the Heritage Zone was eventually imposed in 2015.

**Joe's detection tool helps track coral disease using a neon-green colouration**

**Joe in his element among the coral and fish**

**The JCU coral research team went out on many diving expeditions**

Aboriginals & Torres Strait Islanders in Marine Science: ATSIMS

Before leaving Australia, Joe had an opportunity to visit the Torres Strait Islands to learn about marine resources through a STA Science Ambassadors grant.

Short of funds for accommodation, he ended up staying with a local man from the Torres Strait Regional Authority, Stan Lui.

During the days Joe taught at a local school on Thursday Island. At night he became the student, as Stan offered his wealth of ancestral knowledge.

“It was incredible to hear how much he knew about marine resources, how much of a cultural knowledge base there was. Stan was incredibly passionate, incredibly knowledgeable about marine resources. Coming back from the experience, I was really energised.”

On his return to Queensland, Joe approached James Cook University with a $5,000 proposal to take a group of local indigenous students out to Orpheus Island to learn about marine science. They came back to him with an offer of a $25,000 budget, and a request to create a full program.

Energised, motivated, and now funded, Joe contacted local elders and community education coordinators to explore how to make the idea possible.

He managed to organise a comprehensive educational program that involved the ‘public’ side of marine science, as well as the fieldwork, educational and laboratory sides. The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders in Marine Science program (ATSIMS) was born.

The first ATSIMS itinerary included a trip to Reef HQ, the world’s largest saltwater coral reef aquarium; the Museum of Tropical Queensland, where they were taken on a behind-the-scenes tour and were shown and taught about various indigenous artefacts; the Orpheus Island research station for some fieldwork, as well as the Australian Institute of Marine Science and James Cook University for laboratory visits, classwork, and mentoring on potential scholarships and career pathways in the marine sciences.

“The whole idea was to link students up with indigenous and western marine scientists to present a really diverse array of perspectives, get them excited about this realm of study and research, and then give them the information they would need if they decided this was something they would like to pursue.”

The program was a huge success, and it has since ballooned in popularity and impact. ATSIMS was recognised by the U.S. State Department, with then-U.S. Ambassador to Australia, John Berry highlighting the initiative in 2016.

"Joe has encouraged Indigenous students to turn traditional knowledge about Australia’s unique natural environment in to scientific careers. His work highlights another aspect of our alliance – the connections between our Indigenous and Native cultures.”

Nearly every year since he began ATSIMS, Joe has returned to help out, and some of the kids from the first year of the program are now leading and mentoring the new cohorts.

“It’s crazy – every year I remember the trip back from Orpheus Island with that first group of kids and I think, ‘wow I can’t believe this started out as just an idea’.

“Now we have nearly sixty kids traveling out to the research stations each year, having a great time, and learning about marine science. It’s one of the most rewarding things I’ve ever done in my professional career.”

**Orpheus Island is home to a particularly rich marine ecosystem**

**Each year, the ATSIMS team takes up to 60 indigenous students out to the research station to teach them about marine biology**

**The students get to experience marine science in a truly close-up environment**

CAUGHT AT A CROSSROADS

As soon as his PhD was marked and conferred, Joe once again set his mind to the upscaling his research with a postdoctoral project. He came across another renowned coral researcher, Dr Mónica Medina, professor of biology at Penn State University.

Through a generous National Science Foundation grant, Dr Medina and collaborators at Oregon State University launched the Global Coral Microbiome Project; an ambitious large-scale research initiative that looked at microbial diversity across reef-building corals in various ecosystems across the globe. It purpose was to determine genome sequences and metabolic capabilities of key coral bacteria, and investigate whether, and how, these microbial interactions affect the vulnerability or resistance of different coral species to stress or disease.

“This project was perfect for me – I had been thinking about microbial communities as ecosystems in and of themselves. To really understand what can go wrong in that ecosystem to lead to things such as disease, you need to understand how a healthy microbiome works, and how that differs across geographies, and across the phylogenetic tree of corals.”

Over the course of 18 months, the team took over 3,000 samples across 10 different countries, doing cutting edge microbial community analyses.

Through their research, they were able to answer questions such as how microbial communities have changed across hundreds of millions of years of coral evolution, and whether they have followed similar trajectories of evolution as their coral hosts.

The team found that many aspects of the coral microbiomes do in fact show signs of co-diversification, as their evolution followed a similar path to that of their host. They also learned more about the role that these communities play in fighting coral disease, and fostering resilience.

Two years into this research, Joe found himself at a crossroads. As he was looking into professorships to take the next logical step in his career, he began contemplating the trajectory of his research, and how it fit with his personal aspirations.

“I always want to know that the work I’m doing is providing ground-level benefits to ecosystems, and to the people that depend upon them. As you go further and further down the academic pipeline, you become more and more focussed. I started to wonder whether I might become something like the world leading expert on one particular genus of coral-associated bacteria, and if so, whether that would actually benefit the coral reef ecosystems that I care so deeply about.”

Around the same time, Joe had been helping to develop and implement a National Science Foundation program aimed at creating educational opportunities and career pathways for Virgin Islands youth.

Not only was this an exciting and rewarding form of the spiritual continuation of Joe’s work with ATSIMS, but it also connected him with The Nature Conservancy, a charity organization working around the world to protect ecologically important lands and waters for nature and people.

“When I learned about the work they were doing with their coral strategy, I was really excited, and wanted to be a part of it.

They had a position open as Director of their Coral Strategy in the Caribbean, and the role immediately appealed to me. To be able to decide how their coral conservation strategy would look from a programmatic perspective, as well as working with local teams and partners to implement management, develop science, and innovate ways to restore, monitor, and protect coral reefs was an incredibly exciting opportunity.”

**Lord Howe Island was one of ten destinations selected for the Global Coral Microbiome Project**

THE ULTIMATE GOAL

**Joe's role with The Nature Conservancy focuses on reef conservation in and around the Caribbean**
Credit - Google

Fast-forward to 2018, Joe has now been the Coral Strategy Director for close to a year, and has already achieved a great deal. His work with The Nature Conservancy falls into three primary categories: conservation, restoration, and monitoring.

The conservation component involves large-scale projects with major partners including the Caribbean Challenge Initiative, which aims to protect and effectively manage 20% of the near-shore marine environment in the Caribbean by 2020.

His team is also involved in a lot of on-the-ground work, including the development and planning of an 8,000 km2 marine park in the Dominican Republic.

Restoration includes the scaling up of novel scientific technologies such as microfragmentation techniques pioneered by Mote Marine Lab, which drastically increases the growth rate of coral, and new methods for increasing genetic diversity in collaboration with SECORE International.

Joe also helps organise workshops throughout the Caribbean to help train the staff of other conservation organisations, and share their research and technologies.

Monitoring occurs on numerous levels, from ‘big picture’ satellite photography that utilizes daily highresolution images spanning the entire Earth’s surface to create ‘habitat maps’ for major coral ecosystems in the Caribbean, through to diving teams and aquatic drones that can examine and sample the reefs up close.

They also work with the Carnegie Airborne Observatory, using various high-tech systems such as LIDAR and hyper-spectral imaging to build a comprehensive picture of the health of each ecosystem.

“All of this data gives you a ‘spectral fingerprint’ of different coral species, and the health states of different habitats."

"The information all feeds together so that we can test the effectiveness of different conservation methods, verify the accuracy of the machine-learning algorithms that we’re using to analyse satellite imagery, and help inform the coral conservation and restoration efforts on-the-ground.”

With the mixture of high-level strategizing and ground level, hands-on research and training, Joe seems to have found his true calling at The Nature Conservancy. As he has done with each step in his career, Joe plans to scale up his work to ensure that the work he is doing can benefit as many people as possible.

“I’m excited – the next step will be taking the technologies and data that we’re ground-truthing, and seeing them applied on a Caribbean-wide scale, then ideally on a global scale. The ultimate goal, of course, is getting the reefs back to a healthy state, and getting the benefits that they provide to the people that rely upon them back in place, whether that be tourism, fisheries, or coastline protection.”