Stationary sea sponges are sparking debate in the climate science world with new research into the underwater creatures suggesting the planet could be a lot hotter than we thought.

The world's nations have been committed for the past decade to keeping global warming well under an average 2 degrees Celsius increase, compared with temperatures before the Industrial Revolution.

Thinking sclerosponges from Puerto Rico could be a good collection to investigate, he got in contact with Indiana State University oceanography and palaeoclimatology scientist Professor Amos Winter.

The sponge data seems to track with major global climate modifiers like the massive eruption of Indonesia's Tambora volcano in 1815, which led to a volcanic winter as temperatures dropped around the planet because of ash in the atmosphere

Professor McCulloch said the Caribbean could be used to calculate a global average of temperature warming because there were less variables than other parts of the ocean with no big upwellings or major phenomenon like the El Niño Southern Oscillation.

Gavin Smidt, NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies director, said people should be careful in assuming a proxy from one part of the Atlantic reflected a global average.

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