Geology at the Source

WHOI’s Bill Thompson (center) speaks with students in Barbados about sea level change during the 2009 Geodynamics Seminar, “Climate Change: Forcing, Responses, and Geo-engineering.” Each year, the Geodynamics Seminar Program concludes with a trip to a location related to the program’s geologic theme. Much of what is known today about the rate and magnitude of sea level change during the Quaternary Period (the most recent geological period of time in Earth’s history) comes from studies by Thompson and others of coral reefs in Barbados and elsewhere.(Photo by Andrew Daly, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)