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Tom Chalk

@chalkyoceans.bsky.social
1.1K followers 271 following 65 posts

Dr Chalk, destined to be a researcher of carbonates. CO2, & ocean-climate links, resident isotope geochemist @exoceanlab.bsky.social, @cerege.bsky.social, France. Equalist, technologist, environmentalist. #climatevegan 🌱. 🇬🇧🤝🇲🇫. 🏳️‍🌈 but always with the 🏳️‍⚧️.

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Reposted by Tom Chalk
Jaime @jysuarezibarra.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
Very happy with the gift and amazed by the knitting talent of my colleague #RachelBrown at @unisouthampton.bsky.social, inspired by a figure from a paper led by @carbon8.bsky.social…
Four Globigerinoidws forms in black on a beautifully knitted rainbow background; not to scale.
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Dr. Nina Davtian (she/her/hers) @ninadavtian.bsky.social · 21/08/2026
On this #ForamFriday, I re-up this paper first-authored by @univ-amu.fr PhD student Vincent Guarinos, which is now formally published in @egubg.bsky.social: doi.org/10.5194/bg-2... With his PhD supervisors K. Tachikawa and @chalkyoceans.bsky.social at @climatecerege.bsky.social. 🧪 ⚒️ 🌊 #FossilFriday
doi.org
Planktonic foraminifera iodine ∕ calcium ratio: is it a proxy for dissolved oxygen in the ocean?
Abstract. Direct observations indicate a declining trend in ocean oxygen concentrations, which is not quantitatively captured by models. The complexity of oxygenation variability, linked to both physi...
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exoCean Laboratory @exoceanlab.bsky.social · 02/07/2026
After a couple of months sampling with and for the others - we got to go at sea “for us” and now enjoy these little beauties in the lab 🤩
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Tom Chalk @chalkyoceans.bsky.social · 02/07/2026
These guys just love the heat! So happy it was a good first outing for our new plankton net. 😀
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Tom Chalk @chalkyoceans.bsky.social · 01/06/2026
Cool off from the heat dome (if affected) with a pair of lovely Arctic papers out recently in GCA from UiT (ex-)students Adele Westgård and Freya Sykes. Take your pick, N. pachyderma or G. bulloides, but they are both successfully cultured in the Tromsø polar culture facility with Mohamed Ezat.
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Thibault de Garidel @tdegaridel.bsky.social · 28/04/2026
PhD proposal open till May 10th : if you are interested in imaging and paleo applied to fish communities, apply here to come and work @climatecerege.bsky.social with @chalkyoceans.bsky.social and univ Valparaiso and the Manta group. schadoc.univ-amu.fr/en/projects/...
schadoc.univ-amu.fr
AIOLI | SCHADOC
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Julie Meilland @juliemeilland.bsky.social · 25/03/2026
🚨PhD alert 🚨 together with @tbiard.bsky.social and myself, based mostly in Wimereux with multiple stay in the beautiful @exoceanlab.bsky.social and focused on planktonic rhizarians C export and respiration. Get in touch!
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New Scientist @newscientist.com · 19/03/2026
For the first time, scientists have measured atmospheric gases from the late Pliocene, yielding data that could help to predict the future climate
newscientist.com
Ice core reveals low CO2 during warm spell 3 million years ago
For the first time, scientists have measured atmospheric gases from the late Pliocene, yielding data that could help to predict the future climate
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Tom Chalk @chalkyoceans.bsky.social · 02/03/2026
Really proud of @jysuarezibarra.bsky.social for his upcoming #MSCA research position with us @climatecerege.bsky.social. Not only a really exciting project to help us find out more about the climate system, but also an excellent career step for a superb young researcher.
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David Ho @davidho.bsky.social · 21/02/2026
This story is at once unbelievable and very believable. Come to the US at your own peril under this regime.
theguardian.com
‘Don’t go to the US – not with Trump in charge’: the UK tourist with a valid visa detained by ICE for six weeks
Karen Newton was in America on the trip of a lifetime when she was shackled, transported and held for weeks on end. With tourism to the US under increasing strain, she says, ‘If it can happen to me, i...
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Jaime @jysuarezibarra.bsky.social · 12/02/2026
Four days later, I think I can finally process this: I’ve been awarded a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Postdoctoral Fellowship (#MSCA -PF 2025). 17,066 applications this year. ~9.6% funded. Still feels slightly unreal.
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CNRS @cnrs.fr · 12/01/2026
#CNRSNews 📰 Scientists have set up standards for marine CO2 removal, which could enable extra oceanic storage of carbon dioxide and its recovery as carbonate or biomass. Yet further research is needed prior to large-scale implementation
news.cnrs.fr
Scooping out oceanic CO₂ to make room for more
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exoCean Laboratory @exoceanlab.bsky.social · 24/12/2025
#exocean advent calendar day 24! Today we thought it was a good fit to show an image/talk about “conception”… One of the thing we (try to) do best at ExoCean is planktonic foraminifera reproduction. Here two immaculate mummies… 😏 We would like to wish you all a beautiful Christmas Eve!
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exoCean Laboratory @exoceanlab.bsky.social · 23/12/2025
#exoCeanadvent Day 23: at exoCean we also look at some old questions: in the late 1800s, during the HMS Challenger expedition, they discovered that you can have a constant rain of shells from above, and still end up with a seafloor that looks like the carbonate budget never existed. Why? Pressure. 🌊
HMS Challenger
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David Ho @davidho.bsky.social · 22/12/2025
More politicians, policymakers, and companies should be on Bluesky.
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exoCean Laboratory @exoceanlab.bsky.social · 22/12/2025
#exoCeanadvent Day 22: Winding down for the holidays often means one thing... more mass spectrometry time is available! With our friends in @cerege.bsky.social's #ENVITOP facility, we're making use! Thanks to their equipment we're working on measuring elemental compositions down to the nano-gramme!
Postdoc Matthieu Buisson loads samples into the rack ready for elemental analysis.
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exoCean Laboratory @exoceanlab.bsky.social · 21/12/2025
#exocean advent calendar Day 21! The strongest link between all of us is our love for the ocean. Leaving Marseille with a magnificent sunrise reminds us each time we go out how lucky we are to do what we love for a living! We already have our ship time for the first 6 months of 2026 - exciting!
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Tom Chalk @chalkyoceans.bsky.social · 20/12/2025
Here's to #2026! Please don't hold us to any of these...
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exoCean Laboratory @exoceanlab.bsky.social · 20/12/2025
12 scientific papers 💻, 11 months of good weather 🌞, 10⁴ foram babies 🐚, 9 visiting scientists 👩🏼‍🔬👨🏾‍🔬, 8 successful boat missions 🛥️, 7 website visits 🙏🏼, 6 new hypotheses 💡...*5 gold rings*...4 defended masters 📜, 3 #ForCry mass spec methods 🔍, 2 #Deep-C reactors 🧿...
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exoCean Laboratory @exoceanlab.bsky.social · 19/12/2025
#exoCeanadvent Day 19: Friday edition: today’s post is about the peacocks at CEREGE, because it’s Friday and our brains are in weekend mode. They wander around like they own the campus, scream for no reason, and block paths with absolute confidence. Honestly, goals. 🦚
glorious peacock seducing CEREGE peopleplease feed mewe love peacocks so much they follow us in our offices
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Tom Chalk @chalkyoceans.bsky.social · 18/12/2025
Essential reading for those interested in going carbon negative 👀. See what @sulpis.bsky.social does for a living and how it connects to @exoceanlab.bsky.social here!
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exoCean Laboratory @exoceanlab.bsky.social · 18/12/2025
Read the European Marine Board report here: 📘👀 www.marineboard.eu/publications...
marineboard.eu
Monitoring, Reporting and Verification for marine Carbon Dioxide Removal
Marine Carbon Dioxide Removal (mCDR) methods are being proposed and piloted in Europe. Monitoring, Reporting and Verification (MRV) is a structured process to collect, disclose and independently verif...
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Tom Chalk @chalkyoceans.bsky.social · 17/12/2025
Net accident you say? Ooops, this net came back looking like it had been mauled by a shark, and I think... Maybe it had. A good, but expensive(!) sample. Sorry @tdegaridel.bsky.social!
Look carefully! Fish carefully! A picture of a totally trashed plankton net and the legs of two very tired scientists.
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exoCean Laboratory @exoceanlab.bsky.social · 16/12/2025
#exoCeanadvent Day 16: We're getting closer to the holidays, but we don't stop yet. @erc.europa.eu postdoc @jysuarezibarra.bsky.social was out today presenting his work @maxplanck.de in Mainz. @soniachaabane.bsky.social is also visiting to chat with colleagues.
Jaime introduces his project and ForCry at a team seminar in Mainz. 📷 S. Chaabane
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exoCean Laboratory @exoceanlab.bsky.social · 15/12/2025
#exoCeanadvent Day 15: Some plankton are tiny [citation needed?], and for those we need ways to measure tiny (this is a theme you'll hear us talking about a lot). Sometimes just holding samples in place can be hard.... enter the #Cryostage! ❄️
A rack of tiny samples, about 0.5mm in diameter... Here we've custom made some really clean rings to hold them in place... next step, freeze!
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exoCean Laboratory @exoceanlab.bsky.social · 14/12/2025
#exoCeanadvent Day 14 Footprint reduction: we do lab-based ocean science because we genuinely love it, but also because lab experiments can replace lots of field trips. More control, more insight, and in part, fewer emissions. Bonus: dissolving old sediment cores neutralizes a bit of CO2. 😇
Sometimes you can replace a boat trip with a car trip, ever wondered how much ocean you can get into a Golf?
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exoCean Laboratory @exoceanlab.bsky.social · 13/12/2025
#exoCeanadvent Day 13: Time Machine. Travel back in time with us 6 million years. Part of the reason for our work @exoceanlab.bsky.social is to better understand the past through observing the modern, but sometimes you just need some ancient mud..@chalkyoceans.bsky.social recently went to get some!
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exoCean Laboratory @exoceanlab.bsky.social · 12/12/2025
#exoCeanadvent Day 12: End-of-year celebration - raclette edition. On the agenda for this team meeting: cheese, cheese, cheese, goals for next year: even more cheese. We’ve officially reached our melting point. 🧀
The exoCean team and friends actively brainstorming on hot topics Tiny raclette pan, big ambitions
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exoCean Laboratory @exoceanlab.bsky.social · 11/12/2025
#exoCeanadvent Day 11: Science makes you do strange things. Meet @astridhylen.bsky.social, a postdoc working with carbonate dissolution in coastal sediments. She recently found herself in the middle of a salt marsh, stirring one of the ponds with a (clean) toilet brush taped to a curtain rod.
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Tom Chalk @chalkyoceans.bsky.social · 10/12/2025
There's still much more to come from our trip to Bermuda with @juliemeilland.bsky.social, @thefosterlab.bsky.social and @case4climate.bsky.social. Whilst there, we were all tortured with video interviews... Here's a taster!
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Tom Chalk @chalkyoceans.bsky.social · 09/12/2025
100% recommend for fieldwork. See @maxime-felix.bsky.social for details on availability.
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exoCean Laboratory @exoceanlab.bsky.social · 09/12/2025
#exoCeanadvent Day 9: Meet Maxime (again). At @exoceanlab.bsky.social and @climatecerege.bsky.social Maxime has been conducting several experiments focusing on the culture of marine organisms. One project involved culturing foraminifera in the presence of olivine (Mg,Fe)2SiO4, an igneous mineral.
Don't eat that! A large foraminifera trying to eat grains of olivine. It soon realised that they weren't food, but had no problems afterwards, so... not poison!
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Tom Chalk @chalkyoceans.bsky.social · 08/12/2025
One of many super cool projects started or starting in @exoceanlab.bsky.social. Keep it up Katoo!
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exoCean Laboratory @exoceanlab.bsky.social · 06/12/2025
#exoCeanadvent Day 6: To study the deepest ocean trenches, we’re building reactors that make our lab behave like the deep ocean. Funded by @erc.europa.eu #Deep-C, they will hold cold seawater at ~1000 bar (10km water) so we* watch pressure shape chemistry and biology 🔬🌊 *mostly @sulpis.bsky.social
Schematic of the Deep-C high-pressure reactor and in situ sensors.
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exoCean Laboratory @exoceanlab.bsky.social · 05/12/2025
#exoCeanadvent Day 4: Why did we set up this lab? Part I. What is going to happen to climate as CO2 levels go up? @chalkyoceans.bsky.social and @erc.europa.eu project #ForCry look at CO2 in the past to better understand climate sensitivity. Part of this is making better past CO2 reconstructions.
A schematic graph showing global temperature, plotted against CO2. We know CO2 increases temperature, but the how far and how fast are still not totally constrained. Tipping points, or sensitivity changes could impact this relationship in the future, and may have done in the past.
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Tom Chalk @chalkyoceans.bsky.social · 05/12/2025
Find this data, and more - in the fantastic paper by Elwyn de la Vega. Boron isotope CO2 reconstructions in the Pleistocene have come a long way... but we still have more to come. Watch this space with @mudwaterclimate.bsky.social and many others! cp.copernicus.org/articles/19/...
cp.copernicus.org
Orbital CO2 reconstruction using boron isotopes during the late Pleistocene, an assessment of accuracy
Abstract. Boron isotopes in planktonic foraminifera are a widely used proxy to determine ancient surface seawater pH and by extension atmospheric CO2 concentration and climate forcing on geological ti...
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Tom Chalk @chalkyoceans.bsky.social · 04/12/2025
It might have been 10 years @whoi.edu, but I still wear your hoodie at sea. Thanks for helping me know what to do when I'm there.
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Tom Chalk @chalkyoceans.bsky.social · 04/12/2025
#exoCeanadvent Day 4: At exoCean we also investigate what happens to calcifiers who mysteriously die (answer: a lot happens). For that we must go at sea and collect evidence, just like CSI but with more seasickness pills, same sunglasses.
Tom holding a surface interface core, like a proud father. The core includes the top layer of mud, with the bottom layer of ocean, including all the creatures living there (and more importantly for Tom, the ones long dead too). 

Disclaimer: Tom does not get seasick.
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Tom Chalk @chalkyoceans.bsky.social · 03/12/2025
For reference this is @juliemeilland.bsky.social's exact face every time she gets to play with living foraminifera. #foramwizard.
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Tom Chalk @chalkyoceans.bsky.social · 02/12/2025
Feel so lucky to be a part of this team. It is a geochemist's dream to have foraminifera growing right on site. 🐚🌡️⚡🔬
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exoCean Laboratory @exoceanlab.bsky.social · 02/12/2025
Day 2 of #exoCeanadvent: Come with us to sea (you can also be a land based participant). As an 'inland' ocean lab, we don't quite have the sea on our doorstep, but that doesn't mean we can't bring it to us! We're based just 30–60 minutes from boats out of Marseille and Toulon.
A plankton net (think large wind sock) hangs from the back of a boat. We use these to conduct surveys of the ecosystem and bring back live plankton to the lab.
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exoCean Laboratory @exoceanlab.bsky.social · 01/12/2025
Welcome to the exoCean advent calendar! To get us through the wintery month of December we'll be telling you one thing about our lab everyday this month. (Until the 24th). Stay tuned! Today we unveil our new lab #logo and #website, it's a new era for #exoCean! exocean.academicwebsite.com
The new exoCean lab logo... exoCean written in dark blue, fading to deeper colour at the bottom, the C is orange (think vitamins, think vitality, think #ERC!), there are some bubbles and particles hanging around too.
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Tom Chalk @chalkyoceans.bsky.social · 07/11/2025
So excited to see how this revolutionises foraminifera work. Well done and deserved @juliemeilland.bsky.social, but not sure I can ever forgive you for getting me into the "living stuff" !!
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Gavin Schmidt @climateofgavin.bsky.social · 28/10/2025
This is cool, 6 million year old ice from Antartica with inferred temperature ~12°C warmer than the late Pleistocene. No CO2 level yet! (That will be highly anticipated!) www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
pnas.org
PNAS
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), a peer reviewed journal of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) - an authoritative source of high-impact, original research that broadly spans...
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Tom Chalk @chalkyoceans.bsky.social · 27/10/2025
Just realised that this is as close to an "M2-M2" project as you are likely to get. Explore the aftermath of one of the most interesting features of the Pliocene, MIS M2 during your M2 internship! www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
sciencedirect.com
Exploring the MIS M2 glaciation occurring during a warm and high atmospheric CO2 Pliocene background climate
Prior to the Northern Hemisphere glaciation around ∼2.7 Ma, a large global glaciation corresponding to a 20 to 60 m sea-level drop occurred during Mar…
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Jaime @jysuarezibarra.bsky.social · 15/10/2025
Are you looking for a master's internship (5-6 months)? Constraining tropical planktonic foraminifera depth habitats in a (past) high-CO2 world 🥵🌎 Come to @climatecerege.bsky.social, south of France☀️🇫🇷 Deadline: 15 Nov 2025. Start: Jan-Mar 2026. More info👇 nuage.osupytheas.fr/s/fdAEGQXkwA...
nuage.osupytheas.fr
stage_M2_Suarez-Ibarra.pdf
Nuage - le Nuage de l'OSU Pytheas
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Tom Chalk @chalkyoceans.bsky.social · 27/10/2025
Wonder what carbon was doing in the oceans before humans were around to see? We'll use the chemistry of tiny shells on the seafloor to find out how carbon moved between the ocean and atmosphere over 1 million years ago. Come work with us in 2026 for your M2 internship @climatecerege.bsky.social.
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Tom Chalk @chalkyoceans.bsky.social · 27/10/2025
Interested in improving our knowledge of climate by looking into the past? In the Pliocene the earth was hotter than today, but carbon dioxide was "about the same". Come work with us in 2026 looking at where this crucial information comes from, and how to make it better during an M2 internship.
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Tom Chalk @chalkyoceans.bsky.social · 09/10/2025
New paper(s) alert! Check out @agu.org Palaeoceanography & Paleoclimate. Including our piece on best practices going forward for d11B-CO2 reconstructions. agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/... including @case4climate.bsky.social, @michaelhenehan.bsky.social,... @eleniwater.bsky.social.
agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com
Perspectives for Best Practices in Boron‐Based CO2 Reconstruction
Boron isotopes are an important marine paleoclimate proxy to reconstruct past ocean pH and atmospheric carbon dioxide in geological time Sources of uncertainty of past CO2 estimation shifts from ...
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Olivier Sulpis @sulpis.bsky.social · 02/10/2025
Reminder - the exoCean lab is hiring
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