Environmental Seminar 6th April - Associate Professor Helen Bostock

Open ocean exploration on the Research Vessel Investigator: from the GBR to Antarctica. 

Abstract 

The RV Investigator is Australia’s blue water research vessel. After several delays due to COVID, I have been privileged to participate on two voyages – one to the northern Great Barrier Reef, and the other to Cape Darnley, Antarctica. This talk will cover the aims of the science and the equipment that we use on the ship to explore and study the oceans – from mapping the seafloor, to measure and sampling the waters, and collecting sediment cores to understand how the oceans have changed over time. I will also cover what it is like to live on the research vessel for a few weeks at a time. 

Biography 

Helen Bostock is an Associate Professor in oceanography at UQ, where her research uses stable isotopes (oxygen, carbon), geochemical tracers, sedimentology and microfossils to understand the present and past changes in ocean chemistry to reconstruct ocean circulation (changes in ocean currents and fronts) and its relationship to global climate. She is particularly interested in understanding past changes in the Great Barrier Reef, and at the other extreme past changes in processe at the Antarctic Margin. Helen’s research has focussed on the southwest Pacific (Coral Sea, Tasman Sea and South Pacific) and Southern Ocean. She has participated in a number of research voyages on open ocean vessels including the RV Tangaroa and RV Investigator, including several as lead or co-lead scientist.