If Climate Change^TM isn't mentioned in the grant application your masters thesis will not get funded. If you develop something, who cares.

Brisbane Tech years ago developed a drone which could recognise crown of thorns and kill them. Ever heard of them? I'm old fashioned and one of a rapidly declining group who dived the GBR before the COT devastated it. No one speaking on the subject today saw the spectacle I did as a youngster. The GBR will remain under threat while the COT remains uncontrolled.

It's a big reef and I'm not silly enough to think drones can kill millions of them but for a tiny fraction of the money wasted trying to reduce CO2 we could have a thousand of so of these to let loose on outbreaks. We have aircraft patrolling the reef watching the fishers. Surely they can develop AI further to give early warning of outbreaks.

But who cares, just me.

Crown of Thorns Drone

Researchers have developed autonomous underwater drones designed to combat the crown-of-thorns starfish (COTS) in the Great Barrier Reef. One such drone is called COTSBot, which is capable of identifying and injecting COTS with a lethal solution, achieving an accuracy rate of 99% by 2019.5 Another version, known as RangerBot, is an autonomous underwater vehicle designed to kill COTS by lethal injection.23 These drones are seen as a potential solution to help protect the Great Barrier Reef from the destructive effects of COTS outbreaks.