Scientists Discover 627 Year Temperature Record Trapped in Single Pacific Coral
Our planet’s waters are warming, we know that, however scientists have only been tracking them since the turn of the 20th century. However, a single coral found in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Fiji is giving researchers tons of data on ocean temperatures long before that.
Transcript
00:00Our planet's waters are warming, we know that.
00:06However scientists have only been tracking them since the turn of the 20th century.
00:10However this single coral found in the Pacific Ocean just off the coast of Fiji is giving
00:14researchers tons of data on ocean temperatures long before that.
00:18But how?
00:19Well, it's more than 600 years old, which they say means that trapped within it is more
00:22than 600 years of climate data that has now been harvested.
00:26They collected a sample from the honeycomb coral which was discovered way back in 1998,
00:31finding that it included markers from some 627 years ago, meaning researchers can actually
00:36tell what Pacific Ocean temperatures were all the way back to the year 1370.
00:40The samples revealed that the sea in which the coral resides was around the same temperature
00:44in 1370 and in 1553 as it is today, due to normal variations and cycles in ocean temperatures.
00:51Though coral and paleo oceanographic measurements over the last century illustrate that our
00:55current ocean temperatures are not part of the normal cycle.
00:59The researchers say this coral data is the longest continuous temperature record of its
01:03kind from anywhere in the tropics.