Paul Muir is the Collection Manager/ Researcher for corals at the Museum of Tropical Queensland (MTQ), Townsville and has research interests in mesophotic (deep reef) corals, coral biogeography, coral taxonomy and marine microbiology. Paul worked with the renowned coral researcher and former Principal Scientist, Dr. Carden Wallace for many years at the Museum, assuming responsibility for the large coral collection at MTQ following Dr Wallace’s retirement. Paul has expertise in the group of corals known as the “staghorns” or genera Acropora and Isopora which are the main group of reef corals across much of the Indo-Pacific. The coral collection at MTQ is one of the largest in the world, with over 30 000 specimens collected from reef areas throughout the Indo-Pacific and is a valuable resource for marine researchers. Identification of corals is particularly challenging owing to the high level of intra-specific variation, difficulties in defining species boundaries and because identification schemes are based upon fine skeletal characters which are often impossible to observe in-situ.

  Please note that only publications relevant to mesophotic reefs are indexed.

	Deepest zooxanthellate corals of the Great Barrier Reef and Coral Sea | article Englebert N, Bongaerts P, Muir P, Hay KB, Hoegh-Guldberg O (2014) Marine Biodiversity 45:1-2
	Cyclone damage at mesophotic depths on Myrmidon Reef (GBR) | article Bongaerts P, Muir P, Englebert N, Bridge TCL, Hoegh-Guldberg O (2013) Coral Reefs 32:935
	Diversity of Scleractinia and Octocorallia in the mesophotic zone of the Great Barrier Reef, Australia | article Bridge TCL, Fabricius KE, Bongaerts P, Wallace CC, Muir PR, Done TJ, Webster JM (2012) Coral Reefs 31:179-189
	Mesophotic coral ecosystems on the walls of Coral Sea atolls | article Bongaerts P, Bridge TCL, Kline DI, Muir PR, Wallace CC, Beaman RJ, Hoegh-Guldberg O (2011) Coral Reefs 30:335
	A rare ‘deep-water’ coral assemblage in a shallow lagoon in Micronesia | article Muir PR, Wallace CC (2016) Marine Biodiversity 46:543–544
	Diverse Staghorn Coral Fauna on the Mesophotic Reefs of North-East Australia | article Muir P, Wallace C, Bridge TCL, Bongaerts P (2015) PLoS ONE 10:e0117933
	Lower mesophotic coral communities (60-125 m depth) of the Northern Great Barrier Reef and Coral Sea | article Englebert N, Bongaerts P, Muir PR, Hay KB, Pichon M, Hoegh-Guldberg O (2017) PLoS ONE 12:e0170336
	Species identity and depth predict bleaching severity in reef-building corals: shall the deep inherit the reef? | article Muir PR, Marshall PA, Abdulla A, Aguirre JD (2017) Proc R Soc B
	Acropora tenella, a zooxanthellate coral extending to 110-m depth in the northern Coral Sea | article Muir PR, Pichon M, Squire L, Wallace CC (2018) Mar Biodiv
	High species richness and lineage diversity of reef corals in the mesophotic zone | article Muir PR, Wallace CC, Pichon, Bongaerts P (2018) Proc R Soc B
	The Great Barrier Reef and Coral Sea | chapter Bridge TCL, Beaman RJ, Bongaerts P, Muir PR, Ekins M, Sih T (2019) in: Mesophotic Coral Ecosystems, Coral Reefs of the World () by Loya Y, Puglise KA, Bridge TCL
	Biodiversity of Reef-Building, Scleractinian Corals | chapter Muir PR, Pichon M (2019) in: Mesophotic Coral Ecosystems, Coral Reefs of the World (Springer) by Loya Y, Puglise KA, Bridge TCL
	Mesophotic.org: a repository for scientific information on mesophotic ecosystems | article Bongaerts P, Perez-Rosales G, Radice VZ, Eyal G, Gori A, Gress E, Hammerman NM, Hernandez-Agreda A, Laverick J, Muir P, Pinheiro H, Pyle RL, Rocha L, Turner JA, Booker R (2019) Database (Oxford)
	Global phylogenomic assessment of Leptoseris and Agaricia reveals substantial undescribed diversity at mesophotic depths | article Gijsbers JC, Englebert N, Prata KE, Pichon M, Dinesen Z, Dinesen Z, Brunner R, Eyal G, González-Zapata FL, Kahng SE, Latijnhouwers KR, Muir P (2023) BMC Biology 21:147
	Morphological stasis masks ecologically divergent coral species on tropical reefs | article Bongaerts P, Cooke IR, Ying H, Wels D, den Haan S, Hernandez-Agreda A, Brunner CA, Dove S, Englebert N, Eyal G, Forêt S, Grinblat M, Hay KB, Harii S, Hayward DC, Lin Y, Mihaljević M, Moya A, Muir P, Sinniger F, Smallhorn-West P, Torda G, Ragan MA, Van Oppen MJH, Hoegh-Guldberg O (2021) Curr Biol 31:2286-2298.e8