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      Welcome to Microdocs: The Short Attention Span Science Video on Ecological Sustainability
   What we offer:      Accessing content your way:      This microdoc notebook contains:
   2-4 minute microdocs on sustainability
   examples from coral reefs around the world
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      elements of sustainability
    sustainability on coral reefs
    species on coral reefs
    solutions around the world

Featured microdoc:
The once and future gray whales

How do you estimate gray whale
populations from a time before
anyone knew they existed?

Breaking news in sustainability

Gray whales are thought to have recovered from whaling with current numbers around 20,000. But we only started counting these animals after whaling began, so how can we know for sure how many there used to be?

Written into the DNA of gray whales are clues that can tell us the size of past populations. Large populations have more genetic variation than small ones. The level of variation in gray whale DNA suggests that these whales actually numbered 100,000 in the past, and not 20,000 as we previously thought. What does this mean for the gray whale and the ecosystem they live in?

This film was a ‘Primetime Selection’ in the 2009 San Francisco Ocean Film Festival.

 

contact us at microdocs@stanford.edu

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           All content property of microdocs project.                                                                                                                          Last updated April 9, 2009.
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