Patrick Buerger, a German-born PhD candidate from the Townsville’s Australian Institute of Marine Science has been awarded the grand prize of $5000 AUS for his 360 degree film titled, Coral disease treatment with phage therapy.
Buerger’s creative use of technology allows viewer to make use of virtual reality cinematography for a 360 degree view of the great barrier reef. This clever presentation is seen as a compelling way to bring a complex scientific research topic accessible to a wider audience, enabling new and diverse audiences to get involved and truly immersed themselves into the research.
The winning submission, Coral disease treatment showcases a new method for combatting the spread of bacterial diseases in corals through phage therapy. “Put simply, this involves using a specific virus to treat the highly infectious bacterial diseases that affect coral health, such as black band disease which spreads quickly and kills infected corals within days to weeks.”
Second Place was awarded to Tullio Rossi from The University of Adelaide’s. His video, Lost at Sea, uses creative animation to describe how human-induced ocean acidification could leave fish literally lost at sea, by affecting the evolutionary instinct allowing them to orient themselves using sounds.
Paloma Matis from the University of Technology Sydney captured the popular vote on Facebook to win the Bommies People’s Choice Award. Paloma’s entry,It’s getting hot in here: How will ocean warming affect reef fish, scored 2911 votes to win the largest share of the public vote.
See the winning videos at http://barrierreef.org/our-science/bommies-award and view all the 2015 entries on the Bommies People’s Choice Facebook page.
