SEFS Professor Aaron Wirsing is a co-author on a new study published this week in Science, indicating that overfishing is driving reef sharks toward extinction in coral reefs globally.

The researchers pinpointed overfishing as the main driver of the species’ decline based on 22,000 hours of footage from baited underwater video stations across 391 reefs in 67 nations and territories.

The study revealed declines of 60 to 73% of once-abundant coral reef shark species at reefs around the world. As a result, four of the five main shark species that live on coral reefs — grey reef, blacktip reef, whitetip reef, nurse, and Caribbean reef sharks — have been moved to more threatened categories on the International Union for the Conservation of Natures (IUCN) Red List.

Wirsing was part of a global team of researchers representing over 120 institutions across the world. He contributed data on reef shark populations in Tetiaroa, French Polynesia, from his ongoing work studying the behaviors of adults and juvenile sharks in the atoll’s lagoon. Wirsing deployed baited remote underwater video systems within and outside the lagoon in 2015 to record patterns of shark behavior. Data from these deployments contributed to the global assessment of reef shark populations known as the FinPrint Project, which led to the recent publication in Science.