I graduated (February 2020) t MARUM - Center for Marine Environmental Sciences (University of Bremen). focusing on some fan­tas­tic crea­tu­res in the oce­an: cold-wa­ter co­rals (CWC), particularly the two reef-for­ming spe­cies: Lo­phe­lia per­tu­sa and Ma­dre­po­ra ocu­la­ta. These corals are dis­tri­bu­ted worldwide and pro­vi­de ha­bi­tats for a va­riety of fau­nal com­mu­nit­ies. Additionaly, they are able to form huge three di­men­sio­nal struc­tu­res named coral mounds, which provide information about their past. In the Al­boran Sea, a new “li­ving-co­ral-bar­ren” co­ral mound pro­vin­ce near Me­lil­la has been found in an en­vi­ron­ment which is pro­per for co­ral growth. But our know­ledge about it is limited. Thus one of my tar­gets du­ring my PhD stu­dy was to de­ci­pher the fac­tors con­trol­ling the de­ve­lop­ment of CWCs over geo­lo­gi­cal time­sca­les in this area.

The reason I joined this sci­ence com­mu­ni­ca­ti­on pro­ject is be­cau­se the pol­lu­ti­on of our oce­an is wor­se­ning, and ac­tions need to be ta­ken to pro­tect the ocean. Thus first­ly, we need to sha­re the idea of ocean protection to child­ren who are the fu­ture of our earth, and let them be awa­re of this. Se­cond­ly, this is a good op­por­tu­ni­ty for me to spre­ad my re­se­arch to the pu­blic. The little-known CWCs are an im­port­ant part of the oce­an eco­sys­tem, and they need to be pro­tec­ted. I like to sha­re the know­ledge that we have gai­ned about CWCs, and I hope my sto­ry will interest children and let them know that we need to pro­tect our home — the world and its oce­ans.

My re­search fo­cuses on re­con­struct­ing the past pro­ductiv­ity of the trop­ical In­dian Ocean us­ing coc­co­litho­phores, a group of minute, ex­clus­ively mar­ine hapto­phyte al­gae. These or­gan­isms pro­duce cal­careous outer cov­er­ings with com­plex or­na­ment­a­tions. When they die, the re­mains fall to the sea­floor and are pre­served in sed­i­ments as fossils. My work is centered on iden­ti­fying, count­ing and conducting geo­chem­ical ana­lysis of these mi­cro­fossils to in­ter­pret an­cient en­vir­on­ments and pro­cesses rep­res­en­ted by the sed­i­ments from my study area. I am in­ter­ested in the in­form­a­tion that these re­cords hold and the story that they tell about the past cli­mate and geo­chem­ical cycles. I am keen on learn­ing how and why wa­ter masses move and when they do. I want to know how these pro­cesses af­fect the bio­lo­gical com­munity. Aside from their util­ity as pa­leoen­vir­on­ment and pa­leocean­o­graphic tracers, I also use coc­co­litho­phores in my biostrati­graphic works. Dif­fe­rent spe­cies oc­cur­red and went ex­tinct at dif­fe­rent pe­ri­ods in the geo­lo­gic time, thus fin­ding them in se­di­ment co­res or se­di­men­ta­ry out­crops tells me the age of that in­ter­val. Each chapter of the long his­tory of Earth is be­ing re­vealed by every layer of sed­i­ment that I ex­am­ine - it is like un­cov­er­ing a bur­ied treas­ure every time. And help­ing to make this story un­der­stand­able and ac­cess­ible for every­one is the very reason why I want to be a part of this sci­ence com­mu­nic­a­tion pro­ject.

I am a polar scientist and isotope geochemist. My research deals with reconstructions of past ice-sheet dynamics of the western Greenland Ice Sheet. The Greenland Ice Sheet is the largest storage of freshwater on the northern hemisphere and its development and variations in freshwater contribution to the surrounding seas may significantly impact ocean currents and hence global circulation and climate patterns.

As a polar climate scientist science communication is an essential tool to me, because all changes happening especially in the Arctic can have direct impacts on our life in lower latitudes. I feel that it is our responsibility as scientists to communicate the facts and findings to all interested people. Aside from blogging for my research training group I joined the once upon a time project to promote marine and climate science in a refreshing and straightforward approach. Within the project I am part of the outreach and social media team, support public events and help out with translations and proof-reading.

I am a PhD researcher working in the field of paleontology – the study of ancient life. My main scientific interests are ammonoids. The closest non-extinct relatives to ammonoids and ammonites are modern squids and cuttlefishes.

Even though I was always really into my PhD topic, I realized that I was not fully satisfied with what I was doing. At some point I realized what was bothering me: I was missing the contact and the connection to the "real" world. I soon noticed that I was not the only one with this opinion and that there are manifold projects and opportunities where I could get involved. Especially being a paleontologist, it is often quite easy to fascinate people with stories about our everyday life.

I believe that it is our duty to share our knowledge and make it understandable to society. The benefits of our stories go far beyond their content. Already in ancient times, people accused scientists of being witches and magicians. Of course, nowadays scientists no longer have to fear for their lives. However, especially in times of “Fake News” the scientific world science has to justify itself again and again. This mistrust can only be overcome by one method: More communication and exchange from both sides. “Once upon a time” is a great way to spread scientific content in a fun way.

I’m from Spain and at the time of the development of book 1 I was t MARUM - Center for Marine Environmental Sciences (University of Bremen). I am now at ETH, Zürich. I stu­dy ma­ri­ne se­di­ments to re­con­struct past cli­ma­te and oce­an chan­ges at dif­fe­rent time-sca­les. I main­ly use ma­ri­ne mi­cro­fos­sils of plank­to­nic or­ga­nisms to stu­dy the chan­ges in spe­cies com­po­si­ti­on through time as re­s­pon­se to the shifts in oce­an and cli­ma­te. Oth­er­wise I like ou­t­reach and com­mu­ni­ca­ti­on of cli­ma­te sci­en­ces. I am very in­te­res­ted in fin­ding ef­fec­tive ways of com­mu­ni­ca­ting sci­ence, and in par­ti­cu­lar the ge­ne­ral per­cep­ti­on about cli­ma­te chan­ge and how it should be pre­sen­ted to the non-aca­de­mic pu­blic. I be­lie­ve that edu­ca­ti­on and raising awa­ren­ess through sci­ence com­mu­ni­ca­ti­on play es­sen­ti­al roles in in­cre­a­sing the cli­ma­te chan­ge ad­ap­ta­ti­on and miti­ga­ti­on ca­pa­ci­ties of hu­man so­cie­ties.

At the time of the development t MARUM - Center for Marine Environmental Sciences (University of Bremen). I am interested in the ad­apt­ab­il­ity of small mar­ine cal­ci­fiers (fo­raminifera) to global cli­mate change. Benthic fo­raminifera are im­port­ant cal­cium car­bon­ate pro­du­cers in coastal eco­sys­tems. They sta­bil­ize shorelines and se­cure eco­sys­tem ser­vices. I work in nat­ur­ally ex­tremely warm eco­sys­tems – such as the Per­sian Gulf – and man-made thermally pol­luted areas in the Medi­ter­ranean. In both re­gions local tem­per­at­ures rise to over 35°C in sum­mer. Un­der these con­di­tions, most or­gan­isms liv­ing in sym­bi­osis with mi­croal­gae lose their al­gae. This pro­cess is called bleach­ing. In my work I try to find an­swers on why par­tic­u­lar fo­raminifera can with­stand these ex­tremes. As a geo-eco­lo­gist by train­ing I use a com­bin­a­tion of eco-physiolo­gical meth­ods and mo­lecu­lar ge­netic fin­ger­print­ing to un­der­stand the fate of fo­raminifera in the fu­ture ocean.

My mo­tiv­a­tion for do­ing sci­ence and com­mu­nic­a­tion is that I find it fun and re­ward­ing to change my per­spect­ive through be­ing in­volved in pro­jects other than re­search. Fur­ther­more, I gain a greater and more in­ter­dis­cip­lin­ary view on my re­search hy­po­thesis. I feel a deep urge to com­mu­nic­ate novel sci­entific find­ings to the world. Most sci­ent­ists are fun­ded by pub­lic sources and hence it makes com­mon sense to do so. By con­trib­ut­ing my time for this in­ter­na­tional book pro­ject I hope to raise aware­ness for the beauty of Mother Nature and its need for con­ser­va­tion.

I was a Span­ish postdoc­toral re­searcher work­ing at the Fac­ulty of Geosciences, Uni­versity of Bre­men until 2018 and now at the University of Bristol. I have a sci­entific back­ground in Earth Sci­ences and Geo­logy. I study coc­co­litho­phores (small mar­ine hapto­phyte al­gae) to re­con­struct pa­laeo­pro­ductiv­ity and pa­laeocean­o­graphic changes at dif­fer­ent times­cales, with ac­tual links to pa­laeo­cli­mate and plank­ton eco­logy. My cur­rent pro­ject fo­cuses on the phys­ical and chem­ical con­trols af­fect­ing ex­tant coc­co­litho­phore biogeo­graphy in the Drake Pas­sage (South­ern Ocean) as well as the cal­ci­fic­a­tion re­sponses to re­cent en­vir­on­mental change.

Since I was 4 years old I de­cided that I wanted to be­came a pa­lae­on­to­lo­gist, and later found my­self be­com­ing a mi­cro­pa­lae­on­to­lo­gist. I joined the mul­tidiscip­lin­ary “Once Upon a Time” pro­ject in the hopes of passing on my love and pas­sion for “sci­ence” to the non-aca­demic pub­lic. Storytelling and il­lus­tra­tions are ex­cel­lent ways to raise aware­ness of en­vir­on­mental is­sues (such as cli­mate change, pol­lu­tion, ocean acid­i­fic­a­tion, re­source de­ple­tion, etc) that af­fect kids and grown ups alike. By bridging the gap between sci­ence and art, fu­ture gen­er­a­tions will be in­spired to un­der­stand and pro­tect the en­vir­on­ment for the be­ne­fit of us all.

I am a biologist with a degree from the National University of Córdoba, Argentina. In my PhD research at the Institute of Diversity and Animal Ecology, National Scientific and Technical Research Council (IDEA-CONICET), Argentina, and the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research (AWI), Germany, I focus on the distribution of Antarctic benthic animals and how they are facing climate change with good chances of habitat extension, but also extinction (small wording difference, but huge ecosystem divergence). As air temperatures increased and glaciers retreated, sediment input into the coastal areas became more important. This combined with my interest in science communication brought me to write Plumi’s story. I love dark chocolate.

I am a Geologist with a master’s degree in Marine Biology and Ecology. My PhD research focuses on the study of diatom related organic compounds preserved in the ocean sediments and how they can be used to give information about past ocean and climate dynamics.

Aside from my scientific work, I take every opportunity to use science communication as a tool for engaging society in standing up for human rights and environmental protection, especially focusing on climate change and its challenges and consequences.

I believe that scientific literacy is an important step for a better understanding of our society and ecosystems and an important driver for social change, as it can make people reflect and change towards a more sustainable way of life.

Being passionate about the interaction between science and art, I love nature, performative arts and bringing people together.

Ori­gin­ally from Rus­sia, I did my un­der­ground stud­ies in Ana­lyt­ical Chem­istry (Saint Peters­burg State Uni­versity) but switched to Po­lar and Mar­ine Sci­ences for my mas­ters. I was lucky to par­ti­cip­ate in the Ger­man Rus­sian in­ter­na­tional mas­ter pro­gram PO­MOR (http://pomor.spbu.ru/), where I was in­tro­duced to Ger­man and European sci­ence sys­tems as well as to a new for me topic - po­lar re­search. I be­came fas­cin­ated by the Arc­tic and everything that was con­nec­ted to mar­ine sci­ences and could not ima­gine my­self choos­ing an­other path. This is how I ended up in Bre­men work­ing on my PhD pro­ject in MARUM. I man­aged to com­bine my pas­sion for po­lar sci­ences and geo­chem­ical ex­pert­ise by ana­lyz­ing ra­dio­genic iso­topes (Sr, Pb, Nd) on mar­ine sed­i­ments from Baffin Bay to re­con­struct the pa­leo­cli­mate pat­terns and North Amer­ican ice sheet ex­tents within the last de­gla­cial. Not only I was able to work on this ex­cit­ing topic, but also won a “jack­pot” for PhD stu­dents: the pro­ject was a part of ArcTrain gradu­ate school – a train­ing pro­gram for young po­lar re­search­ers. I be­lieve be­ing a part of the gradu­ate school provides nu­mer­ous be­ne­fits for stu­dents: sci­entific and soft-skills train­ings, field trips, joint meet­ings, and con­fer­ences, and in the end – for me the most re­ward­ing res­ult – a wide in­ter­na­tional net­work of arc­tic sci­ence pro­fes­sion­als and friends.

Dur­ing my PhD I star­ted to get to know an­other side of the sci­ence world – the side of sci­ence com­mu­nic­a­tion, out­reach, and man­age­ment. Step by step I star­ted to get in­volved: work­ing on the ArcTrain Blog, out­reach bro­chure... Then I dis­covered the pro­ject “Once Upon A Time” last year and could not avoid get­ting in­volved. I real­ized, al­though I still like sci­ence in its strict sense, this is what I en­joy do­ing the most: im­prov­ing com­mu­nic­a­tion among sci­ent­ists and between the sci­ence world and pub­lic world, “spread the word”. There­fore now, after fin­ish­ing my PhD, I am ex­cited to de­velop this in­terest into a ca­reer.

I be­lieve writ­ing stor­ies, which can show kids (and adults!) how our world is built and what sci­ent­ists do, can ig­nite in­terest and is one of the best meth­ods of reach­ing out to people and in­volving them in this ad­ven­ture of study­ing our planet. There is al­ways more that we can do, but I am pos­it­ive this pro­ject is a good start!

As a pa­leoe­co­lo­gist, I have re­searched mod­ern, sub-fossil, and fossil mar­ine in­ver­teb­rate as­semblages from tem­per­ate seagrass hab­it­ats to trop­ical shal­low-wa­ter coral reefs to deep-sea coral eco­sys­tems. Cur­rently my re­search is fo­cused on the tax­onomy and eco­lo­gical ana­lysis of Pleis­to­cene sol­it­ary cold wa­ter cor­als from the North­w­est Shelf of Aus­tralia. These cor­als were col­lec­ted in sed­i­ment cores dur­ing In­ter­na­tional Ocean Dis­cov­ery Pro­gram (IODP) Ex­ped­i­tion 356, and they rep­res­ent the first sub­stan­tial Qua­tern­ary fossil re­cord of deep-sea, sol­it­ary cor­als from the re­gion.

I be­lieve that the more an in­di­vidual un­der­stands their local and global eco­sys­tems, the more they will re­spect and re­cog­nize their role, and ul­ti­mately their re­spons­ib­il­ity, in them. By com­mu­nic­at­ing our sci­ence through stor­ies, we hope to sim­ul­tan­eously in­form and in­cite curi­os­ity and ex­cite­ment in our read­ers about the ocean and their global en­vir­on­ment.

I am a PhD researcher at the Leibniz Centre for Tropical Marine Research (ZMT), University of Bremen, Germany. My research interests encompass coral reef ecology, spatial ecology and interactions as well as socioecological interactions. I am interested in determining how human impact affects or alters coral reef communities. I am currently investigating how local stressors (pollution, coastal development and mangrove deforestation) affect coral reefs in the Mexican Caribbean Sea. I earned a bachelor’s degree in hydrobiology at the Metropolitan Autonomous University (UAM), Mexico. Subsequently, I completed a master’s in geomatics at the Centre for Research in Geography and Geomatics (CentroGeo), Mexico. I then became passionate about mapping the space and time of natural ecosystems via remote sensing. I enjoy communicating science through stories, theatre, music and maps.

I’m a young geo­lo­gist from Italy and my PhD pro­ject title is “Spa­tio-tem­poral dis­tri­bu­tion of cold-wa­ter cor­als in the SE At­lantic”. Cold-wa­ter cor­als (CWC) are the en­gin­eers of large deep-sea eco­sys­tems and form unique biod­iversity hot­spots along most of the world’s con­tin­ental mar­gins. Over the re­cent years it has be­come ob­vi­ous that CWC of­ten con­struct si­gni­fi­cant sea floor ele­va­tions known as cold-wa­ter co­ral mounds. The­se mounds can also ser­ve as pa­leo-ar­chi­ves with re­spect to the pa­leo­en­vi­ron­men­tal set­ting as well as to the co­ral de­ve­lop­ment. Us­ing ma­te­ri­al recently col­lec­ted from the Na­mi­bi­an and An­go­lan con­ti­nen­tal mar­gins du­ring the M122 ex­pe­di­ti­on in ear­ly 2016, my pro­ject aims to re­con­struct the de­ve­lop­ment of cold-wa­ter co­rals in this re­gi­on in re­s­pon­se to chan­ging en­vi­ron­men­tal con­di­ti­ons through the last gla­ci­al-in­ter­gla­ci­al cy­cle.

Sin­ce I star­ted my aca­de­mic ca­re­er, my first goal has been to talk about my pas­si­on for geo­lo­gy and ex­plain it to peop­le and friends of dif­fer­ent cul­tural back­grounds. I con­sider that the re­se­arch and the stu­dy, main­ly when the to­pic has worldwide im­port­an­ce, are useless without ef­fi­cient com­mu­nic­a­tion. "Once Upon a Time" is a good chance to in­form more people and to get them in­ter­ested in our fas­cin­at­ing and in­ter­est­ing world - to get them in­ter­ested in to the blue.

My re­se­arch area is or­ga­nic geo­che­mis­try, in which I have been work­ing sin­ce 2001. Du­ring my ca­re­er I have ana­ly­zed sam­ples from dif­fe­rent and ex­cit­ing ma­ri­ne en­vi­ron­ments in­clu­ding: me­tha­ne bio/​​geo­sys­tems, the deep Arc­tic Oce­an, hy­dro­ther­mal vent sys­tems, the Chi­le­an fjords and the Gulf of Me­xi­co af­ter the deep wa­ter ho­ri­zon oil spill. I am in­te­res­ted in the iden­ti­fi­ca­ti­on of mole­cu­les that can be re­la­ted to bio­lo­gi­cal pro­ces­ses that af­fect the flux of mat­ter and en­er­gy in ma­ri­ne en­vi­ron­ments and what the­se mole­cu­les can tell us about the­se li­ving sys­tems.

As a sci­en­tist and also as a mo­ther, I re­co­gni­ze the ne­ces­si­ty of pas­sing part of what I have lear­ned about earth sci­ences to my kids but also to other peop­le. The op­por­tu­ni­ty to ex­plo­re and learn how to com­mu­ni­ca­te sci­ence as part of this team is a gre­at op­por­tu­ni­ty that al­lows us to in­te­gra­te our know­ledge from a va­rie­ty of di­sci­pli­nes and to com­mu­ni­ca­te it in a fri­end­ly con­text, which I think is an im­port­ant task for us and the best way to edu­ca­te fu­ture ge­ne­ra­ti­ons on how to be con­scious about our en­vi­ron­ment.

I am a palaeoceanographer (an oceanographer of the past oceans) and an expert in planktic foraminifera and geochemistry. I am currently working t MARUM - Center for Marine Environmental Sciences (University of Bremen), University of Bremen, Germany, where my research is devoted to better understanding the cold-water coral ecosystems in the Atlantic Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea with regard to past climate changes. I hold a bachelor’s degree in biology/life sciences from UNIRIO, Brazil, and a Master’s and PhD in geosciences from UFF, Brazil. I wrote the story ‘My life, your life’ for this book with the support and contribution of my non-academic sparring partner Sonja.

I have a degree in communication management, and I am a certified translator (German-English). I have been working as a scientific and legal translator as a side job for several years now and delight now to have contributed to science communication.

Be­ing hooked on cli­ma­te stu­dies and ma­ri­ne mi­cro­pa­leon­to­lo­gy sin­ce the first se­mes­ter of my Ba­che­l­or’s stud­ies, I de­ci­ded to dive de­eper into this field of re­se­arch. To­day, I am a PhD stu­dent at MARUM, work­ing on cli­ma­te chan­ge by ana­lyz­ing eco­sys­tems and their re­s­pon­se to chan­ging en­vi­ron­men­tal con­di­ti­ons.

Sin­ce the start of the in­dus­tri­al re­vo­lu­ti­on, at­mo­s­phe­ric CO2 has in­crea­sed by around 100 ppm due to a ri­sing in­put of an­thro­po­ge­nic car­bon di­oxi­de. The con­cern about the ri­sing pro­por­ti­on of the green­hou­se gas has heigh­te­ned du­ring the last de­ca­des because chan­ges in the con­cen­tra­ti­on of at­mo­s­phe­ric CO2 and sur­face air tem­pe­ra­tu­re are clo­se­ly re­la­ted. Howe­ver, the oce­ans can store lar­ge amounts of car­bon di­oxi­de and act as a re­ser­voir for car­bon. The­re­fo­re, the in­crea­se in at­mo­s­phe­ric CO2 only re­flects about 70% of the to­tal an­thro­po­ge­nically-ad­ded gas because much of the rest has been ta­ken up by the oce­ans. Con­tem­pla­ting this, even small chan­ges in the oce­an re­ser­voir or its dri­ving forces can have a si­gni­fi­cant im­pact on the con­cen­tra­ti­on of at­mo­s­phe­ric car­bon di­oxi­de. To de­ter­mi­ne the im­pacts, am­pli­tu­de and dri­ving forces be­hind such chan­ges, an un­der­stan­ding of the glo­bal car­bon cy­cle is ne­cessa­ry. Because ma­ri­ne pri­ma­ry pro­duc­tion is an im­port­ant part and con­trol­ling me­cha­nism of the ma­ri­ne car­bon cy­cle, an un­der­stan­ding of the re­s­pon­ses of the eco­sys­tems, i.e. ocea­nic bio­pro­duc­tivi­ty is es­sen­ti­al.

Just as im­port­ant as bio­tic re­s­pon­ses to chan­ging en­vi­ron­men­tal con­di­ti­ons, so are the re­s­pon­ses of hu­man kind to our on­go­ing glo­bal cli­ma­te chan­ge! As the fu­ture of our pla­net de­pends more than ever on po­li­ti­cal de­ci­si­ons con­cern­ing en­vi­ron­men­tal pro­tec­tion, it is an es­sen­ti­al task to com­mu­ni­ca­te the cli­ma­te chan­ge is­sue to the pu­blic. It is si­gni­fi­cant­ly im­port­ant to arou­se an un­der­stan­ding of the me­cha­nisms and feed­backs trig­ge­ring a chan­ging cli­ma­te and its con­se­quen­ces. I de­ci­ded to join the “Once Upon A Time” pro­ject because it po­ses a gre­at op­por­tu­ni­ty to con­vey this to­pic to peop­le who are not usual­ly in­vol­ved in this is­sue. Es­pe­cial­ly kids are open and cu­ri­ous for new know­ledge when it is com­mu­ni­ca­ted in an ade­qua­te way. Tel­ling an easy-to-un­der­stand sto­ry crea­tes me­mo­r­able and con­nec­ta­ble know­ledge, which is es­sen­ti­al to arou­se em­pa­thy for the is­sue. Sin­ce they are the ge­ne­ra­ti­on that will have to deal with the con­se­quen­ces of cli­ma­te chan­ge, we should use pro­jects like “Once Upon A Time” to familiarize our kids with this chal­lenge.

My research was part of a MARUM pro­ject which aimed to un­ra­vel the role of oce­ans in cli­ma­te chan­ge. I try to im­pro­ve our un­der­stan­ding about the in­ter­ac­tions bet­ween oce­an and cli­ma­te in the wes­tern tro­pi­cal Pa­ci­fic Oce­an. This re­gi­on is in­te­res­ting be­cause ocean tem­per­at­ures here are ex­tremely high. Huge amounts of heat and wa­ter va­por are trans­por­ted to the at­mo­s­phe­re. This may im­pact the cli­ma­te world­wi­de. In ad­di­ti­on, Pa­ci­fic wa­ters flow into the In­dian Oce­an via the so-cal­led In­do­ne­si­an Through­flow (ITF). The ITF is re­gar­ded as a ma­jor com­po­nent of the glo­bal ocea­nic cir­cu­la­ti­on sys­tem and im­port­ant for the re­gu­la­ti­on of sal­in­i­ty and heat bud­gets of the Pa­ci­fic and In­dian Oce­ans. With this back­ground, my stu­dy aims to in­ves­ti­ga­te the in­flu­ence of South Pa­ci­fic wa­ter mas­ses on the ITF, and their pos­si­ble in­ter­ac­tion with the wes­tern Pa­ci­fic hy­dro­cli­ma­te du­ring the past. I use geo­che­mi­cal pro­xies like ele­ment ra­ti­os in plank­tic fo­ra­mi­ni­fe­ra shells. Fo­ra­mi­ni­fe­ra are tiny or­ga­nisms li­ving in the wa­ter co­lumn. Their shell com­po­si­ti­on de­pends on pa­ra­me­ters like tem­pe­ra­tu­re or sal­in­i­ty. When fo­ra­mi­ni­fe­ra die, their shells are bu­ried in the seaf­loor se­di­ment, which we can re­co­ver to ana­ly­ze the shell com­po­si­ti­on.

I am con­vin­ced that it is im­port­ant that more peop­le get a ba­sic un­der­stan­ding about the oce­ans and cli­ma­te chan­ge. Ex­cit­ing sto­ries have the power to reach peop­le and im­part sci­en­ti­fic fin­dings to the so­cie­ty. For me, this pro­ject is a great op­por­tun­ity to learn how we can make sci­ence un­der­stand­able.

I am a doctoral candidate at the Leibniz Centre for Tropical Marine Research (ZMT), University of Bremen, Germany. I hold a Master’s degree in environmental management from the Institute for Ecosystem Research at the Christian-Albrecht University of Kiel and a bachelor’s degree in biology from Mackenzie Presbyterian University, Brazil. Drawing offers me a way of relaxing and a new dimension to communicate my science.

Once upon a time the famous physicist Albert Einstein was confronted by an overly concerned woman who sought advice on how to raise her small son to become a successful scientist. In particular she wanted to know what kinds of books she should read to her son.

‘Fairy Tales,’ Einstein responded without hesitation.

‘Fine, but what else should I read to him after that?’ the mother asked.

‘More fairy tales,’ Einstein stated.

‘And after that?’

‘Even more fairy tales,’ replied the great scientist, and he waved his pipe like a wizard pronouncing a happy end to a long adventure.

Jack Zipes, Break­ing the Ma­gic Spell: Rad­ical The­or­ies of Folk and Fairy Tales (1979)

Data equi­val­ent to 5 mil­lion laptops are pro­duced every­day on our planet. It is a lot! But how much of it do we really need to learn about? As a mar­ine eco­lo­gist, and an in­hab­it­ant of the Earth, I be­lieve that en­vir­on­mental is­sues are among the most ur­gent les­sons to be taught and learned. And not only among sci­ent­ists: every single per­son on this planet has the right to un­der­stand, dis­cuss, and con­trib­ute to the body of know­ledge and to the de­cisions we make about our en­vir­on­ment. Our ac­tions today will shape our home to­mor­row, and it is high time to start tak­ing ac­tion. And what would be a bet­ter way to spread in­form­a­tion and in­vite for ac­tion than a story?

I am grate­ful and ex­cited to par­ti­cip­ate in the Once Upon a Time pro­ject, and I hope you join us and have fun in this ad­ven­ture as well!

I studied Mar­ine Geosciences and a Mas­ter in Geosciences at the Uni­versity of Bre­men. Cur­rently, I am working on my PhD at GEOMAR, Kiel in the field of paleoceanography. The shell com­pos­i­tion of foraminifera (e.g. stable iso­tope com­pos­i­tion) de­pends on cli­mate re­lated para­met­ers such as tem­per­at­ure. There­fore, fo­raminifera are of­ten used to study cli­mate vari­ations. In my pro­ject, I in­vest­ig­ate the in­flu­ences of wa­ter con­di­tions on the shell com­pos­i­tion of fo­raminifera in or­der to sup­port fu­ture cli­mate change in­vest­ig­a­tions based on data gained from these or­gan­isms.

I am really ex­cited to be part of the sci­entific com­munity, and I am al­ways happy to share my know­ledge about re­search top­ics like cli­mate change with oth­ers. While work­ing on an earlier pub­lic re­la­tions pro­ject, I no­ticed how much in­terest there is for ocean and cli­mate sci­ence within the pub­lic. Yet, only if it is com­mu­nic­ated in an ad­equate way are people able to un­der­stand our sci­ence. It is im­port­ant to also in­clude kids in pro­jects of sci­ence com­mu­nic­a­tion. They are al­ways curi­ous to learn more about the world around them and will be the ones that have to deal with the con­sequences of our chan­ging en­vir­on­ment. By read­ing the ex­cit­ing “Once upon a time” stor­ies they will learn about our planet, the oceans and the im­pact that hu­mans can have on these sys­tems. This way I hope that we will pro­mote the kids’ and their par­ents’ aware­ness for the en­vir­on­ment.

I’m from Chile. I’ve stud­ied Bio­chem­istry at the Uni­versity of Chile and also got my Mas­ter’s de­gree in Ap­plied Bio­chem­istry at the same in­sti­tu­tion. In 2016 I star­ted my PhD stud­ies t MARUM - Center for Marine Environmental Sciences (University of Bremen). My re­search is fo­cused on the “bio­lo­gical and non-bio­lo­gical gen­er­a­tion of metal­lic nan­o­particles in mar­ine shal­low hy­dro­thermal sys­tems”. The rel­ev­ance of metals in mar­ine en­vir­on­ments and their in­flu­ence on local mi­cro­bial com­munit­ies en­cour­aged me to pur­sue post-gradu­ate stud­ies in ocean sci­ences in or­der to bet­ter un­der­stand and help areas con­tam­in­ated by those toxic ele­ments (metals such as ar­senic). That's why for me pro­jects like "Once Upon a Time" are im­port­ant for sci­entific com­mu­nic­a­tion. The gen­er­a­tion of new know­ledge in dif­fer­ent fields of re­search is not enough. Proper ef­forts from sci­entific com­munit­ies should be per­formed, bring­ing in a real, simple and in­ter­est­ing way the in­form­a­tion/​data can be com­mu­nic­ated with every single per­son, fam­ily, school or in­sti­tu­tion to im­ple­ment changes that would help to pre­serve our rivers, lakes, seas and oceans.

I am an environmental scientist focused on environmental chemistry, floating between biologists, ecotoxicologist and analytical chemists in order to study the effects and occurrence of pollutants in aquatic ecosystems. I did my PhD at IDAEA-CSIC in Barcelona (where I met Maria, my co-author) about Global occurrence of Persistent Organic Pollutants in the Open Ocean and including a circumnavigation around the Atlantic, Indian and Pacific Oceans. After my PhD I’ve keep working in different sources of anthropogenic pollution such as long range transport, aquaculture and wastewater treatment plants, in successive postdocs in IQOG-CSIC (Madrid), IMDEA Water (Madrid) and the Marine Station of Plentzia from the University of the Basque Country, where I’m based at the moment. By joining biological tools (bioassays, genetics, population ecology) and analytical chemistry, I try to disentangle the complex relations between chemical pollution and natural responses of organisms and humans.

But science is not finished until it is communicated! So outreach and communication activities also fill my time, including storytelling. Young public is our hope for the future, so if we can convince them that we can save our planet, maybe we still have a chance.

I am a researcher in environmental chemistry and environmental genomics and met Belén at the Institute of Environmental Assessment and Water Research (IDAEA-CSIC), Spain, where we developed the scientific work now transformed into this children’s tale.

I took part in this project while working on my PhD at AWI and at the De­part­ment of Bio­logy and Chem­istry - FB2 at the Uni­versity of Bre­men. My re­se­arch area is oce­an op­tics. Du­ring my ear­lier ye­ars of study­ing in China, I fo­cused on the op­tical prop­er­ties of phyto­plank­ton and colored dis­solved or­ganic mat­ter in the Chinese coastal ocean. They are the ba­sis of re­mo­te de­tec­tion and pre­dic­tion of ma­ri­ne chlo­ro­phyll-a con­cen­tra­ti­on, phy­to­plank­ton com­mu­ni­ty struc­tu­re and dis­sol­ved or­ga­nic car­bon. My PhD pro­ject fo­cuses on as­ses­sing the im­pact of cli­ma­te chan­ge on phy­to­plank­ton in the Fram Strait. Cur­rent­ly I've been ded­ic­ated to gen­er­ate a high-resolution chlo­ro­phyll-a con­cen­tra­ti­on da­ta­set for the Fram Strait from in situ op­ti­cal sen­sors – such as the ab­sorp­tion at­te­nua­ti­on spec­tra me­ter (AC-S), ship-ba­sed chlo­ro­phyll-flu­or­i­meter of fer­ry box and au­to­no­mous un­der­wa­ter ve­hi­cles (AUV) – with the com­bi­na­ti­on of data from oce­an color sa­tel­li­te sen­sors such as MO­DIS-Aqua, MO­DIS-VI­IRS and pro­bab­ly the newly laun­ched OLCI.

To be in­vol­ved in this sci­ence com­mu­ni­ca­ti­on pro­ject is mea­ning­ful. For ye­ars I have no­ti­ced the spe­cial­iz­a­tion of each ma­ri­ne re­se­arch area, which made it dif­fi­cult for “ex­perts in ocea­no­gra­phy” to un­der­stand each stu­dy area, not to men­tion the dif­fi­culties for the pub­lic. And the­re is a gre­at lack of pie­ces of work writ­ten in un­der­stan­da­ble lan­gua­ge for an “outs­ide” per­son. For a long time I've been hop­ing to have the op­por­tu­ni­ty to wri­te and be trai­ned to wri­te some un­der­stan­da­ble sto­ries re­la­ted to ma­ri­ne sci­ence both in my mo­ther lan­gua­ge Chinese as well as in Eng­lish. This pro­ject fits per­fectly with my mo­tiv­a­tion.

I studied Biology and Scientific Illustration. I decided to specialize in this last field due to the importance that images have as a visual support to texts and because of the way they can help making science approachable to audiences. I have illustrated the story “The lonely bacterium and the toxic friends” in Volume 2 and helped translating the book into Spanish.

I am a climate scientist at Jacobs University in Bremen and the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in Bremerhaven, Germany. My research focus is on climate modelling: the simulation of weather and climate on supercomputers to help us better understand and predict future changes in the climate system. One of my reasons for becoming a scientist was the hope that I could help better understand and consequently protect nature and the biodiversity on the planet. I have always been passionate about writing and telling stories as well as about science communication.

I am a postdoctoral researcher and climate modeller at the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in Bremerhaven, Germany. I work on the mechanisms of climate variability and systematic errors in climate models. My scientific goal is to add previously missing features and processes (for example: mesoscale ocean eddies, leads in sea ice or the drift of icebergs) to current climate and weather simulations. These additions will improve the predictions made by the models. I am very interested in art and science communication and am always looking for new creative ways to visualise climate change and its impacts for the public. Instagram: @polarthomas

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Already as a child, I was strongly fascinated by nature and all the beauty the planet Earth offers to us, its residents, the human beings. Studying geography, I more and more got to know the huge complexity of the planet – and I am still amazed about it! But focusing on climate science, I also realized more and more the fragility of the system, and the strong impact of human beings.

Today, I am a PhD student at MARUM - Center for Marine Environmental Sciences (University of Bremen), analyzing one component – planktonic foraminifera – of the marine carbon cycle in the Arctic Ocean. With the Arctic Ocean as my main study area, I am even more confronted with the impact of human activities on the climate system and the nature. Sea ice is shrinking, species are shifting, the whole system as we know it becomes shaky. And the more I see the impact, the more I want to tell people about it. For me, one of the most effective weapon against climate change is education. Only if people understand the crisis we are heading into, they will start fighting against it. Only if people understand their impact, they change their behavior. And only if we, scientists, tell them what we know, they can gain this powerful knowledge.

This is my motivation to per part of the Once Upon A Time – Team: I want to contribute to education, I want to show both beauty and fragility of the planet we are living on.

I am a Marine Geoscientist from Germany, I studied at the University of Bremen, and I am now a PhD student at the Senckenberg am Meer institute in Wilhelmshaven. During an expedition to Svalbard, I fell in love with the polar environments and later I had the chance to study bioerosion in the Arctic and Antarctic for my PhD. Bioerosion is broadly speaking of the “destruction” and/or “dissolution” of hard substrates by organisms and is usually in balance with the “production” of carbonate. However, climate change and the continuing acidification of the oceans are likely to shift this balance towards bioerosion to an extent not yet predictable.

During my PhD project and even now I always had one foot in the door of science communication by participating in science slams, writing popular science articles, taking over social media accounts, and being part of this great project. I see it as my responsibility to share science and knowledge with the public and to raise awareness.

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I am a geologist and oceanographer working in the coastal zone. I am particularly interested in better understanding and predicting how the movement of water put in motion and transport sediment (gravel, sand and mud at the bottom of seas and rivers) and creates coastal landscapes. This is particularly important considering the present and future sea level rise due to the human-made climate change.

With the help of my mum, Christine Lafon, I have been translating some of the stories in French. As a mum of three, I am also interested in getting many children to read and discuss the "Once Upon a Time" stories.

I have a PhD in chemistry and I was a postdoc at the University of Pennsylvania, USA. Back in Germany, I worked in human genetics at the University of Göttingen. After almost 10 years there, I secured a permanent position at the Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology, Bremen, as a scientific coordinator. The translation of scientific topics into something understandable for the general public was my major task for more than 20 years in Bremen as a press officer. I am glad to have participated in several scientific expeditions in the Pacific, South Atlantic and the North Sea. Now I am enjoying my retirement and happy to participate in this project. I have been a sketcher and kept recording everyday situations in my sketchbooks all my life. You can have a look here:

www.flickr.com/photos/manfredschloesser

I am a PhD researcher investigating about the Artic within the Canadian-German program ArcTrain. In 2018 I spent several months at the MARUM and there I got to know the project and offer translating to French. It is a thick book! so I am very happy that Marine Le Minor, Yann Marcon and Sarah Coffinet joined in the translation effort. All texts are translated and the Book will be soon uploaded!

I work at MARUM - Center for Marine Environmental Sciences (University of Bremen), and earned a doctorate in palaeoceanography from the University of Bremen. I conduct chemical analyses of foraminifera shells in order to reconstruct ocean conditions of the past. I am interested in science communication and teaching as well as how best to convey complicated topics like global chemical cycles. I also like drawing... and bees.

Already as a child I was deeply interested in the behavior of different animal species.

Therefore, I chose biology with the main focus on behavioral biology for my bachelor's degree. I started my studies in Germany and continued in the USA. I also did a master's degree. Afterwards I received my doctorate at the LMU in Munich with a PhD thesis on the genetics and behaviour of honey bees. This was followed by a research stay at the University of California in Berkeley, where I worked on the topic of learning in honey bees. Back in Germany, I established a bee research center at the University of Bremen and later supported the establishment of a similar research center in Cameroon at the University of Ngaoundere. This was followed by further international cooperation with bee researchers from South Africa, South India and the USA. The biology of honey bees, as a worldwide topic, has become the focus of my research.

As a palynologist, I use fossil pollen and spores preserved in marine sediments to reconstruct the vegetation of past times. Fossil pollen assemblages can tell us which plants grew in a certain area at a certain time. Since plants have different known climatic requirements, we can interpret pollen records in terms of rainfall and temperature changes as well. In my PhD, I study the vegetation of western equatorial South America during the Pliocene (5.3 to 2.6 million years ago). The Pliocene was an epoch in Earth's history when many boundary conditions were similar to today, e.g. the arrangement of the continents, greenhouse gas concentrations, and flora and fauna. However, the Arctic was not yet covered by ice sheets, and the global climate was warmer, making this epoch predestined to study the drivers and mechanisms of warm climates. Understanding past climates is key for better understanding and constraining present and future climate developments.

The reason I joined the “Once upon a time” project is because I believe it can build a bridge between scientists and the public. Scientific content which is inherently abstract and complicated is made accessible to a broad audience. If we want to have a positive impact on the development of our planet, we have to raise awareness of issues such as environmental pollution and human-induced climate change in an understandable way.

I am an early-stage researcher at MARUM - Center for Marine Environmental Sciences (University of Bremen) specializing in marine geotechnics. My research uses laboratory methods to investigate the change of sediments’ shear strength affected by earthquakes. Big earthquakes may trigger submarine landslides causing disastrous tsunamis. On the contrary, small earthquakes, which are not strong enough to trigger landslides may in turn strengthen and stabilize the seafloor because of the densification process associated with the tremor.

Having spent more than 6 years in Europe, I have realized what a pity it is that great initiatives do not get to be known in other parts of the world because of language barriers. Therefore, I find it important to communicate knowledge using local languages. My contribution to the "Once Upon a Time" project is to translate the scientific stories into Taiwanese mandarin so that they can be introduced to an even bigger audience outside Europe.