Coral reefs share genetic material across wide areas, with help from ocean currents. This ability is especially important during episodes like the mass bleaching currently occurring.
If Australia wants to maintain the world-heritage status of the Great Barrier Reef – indeed, if it wants to preserve the reef at all – we must act now to prevent more coral deaths.
Artificial reef stars have been added to damaged coral reefs in Sulawesi, Indonesia. A new study shows that within just four years, restored reefs are thriving as much as healthy reefs.
The best strategy to protecting Earth’s coral reefs is to dramatically cut greenhouse gas emissions. But in the meantime, we must urgently make corals more resilient.
Reef sculptures are a form of artifical reef: man-made structures placed into an aquatic environment to mimic certain characteristics of a natural reef.
A bleaching event at a reef in Key Largo, Fla. The complex interplay of temperature and cloud cover is at the heart of cloral bleaching events.
(Liv Williamson/University of Miami Rosenstiel School of Marine, Atmospheric, and Earth Science via AP)
Understanding how both cloud cover and temperature work to promote coral bleaching provides valuable insight into how reefs will change over various climate scenarios.
After a chance discovery in the lab, this team used IVF to make hundreds of coral babies for restoration projects in New South Wales. So far the IVF babies are doing well in the wild.
Coral reefs in the waters of Tatawa Besar, a popular dive site near Komodo Island in Indonesia, photographed in 2009.
AP Photo/Dita Alangkara, Fil
Paul Hardisty, Australian Institute of Marine Science dan Line K Bay, Australian Institute of Marine Science
We used to focus just on protection of vital ecosystems like the reef. But as climate change and other threats accelerate, we need to actively help nature get ready for the heat.
Climate change is making oceans more acidic globally. Now, scientists are finding that large storms can send pulses of acidic water into bays and estuaries, further stressing fish and shellfish.
A saltier Red Sea could threaten its marine life.
Dudarev Mikhail/Shutterstock
New data shows coral cover in the Great Barrier Reef is at a record high, despite a disturbing decade of marine heatwaves, cyclones and floods. While the data is robust, it can be deceptive.
Many places have banned sunscreens with certain chemicals in an attempt to help protect coral reefs.
Westend61 via Getty Images
Researchers have long suspected that an ingredient in sunscreen called oxybenzone was harming corals, but no one knew how. A new study shows how corals turn oxybenzone into a sunlight-activated toxin.
An underwater forest formed by the purple gorgonian (Paramuricea clavata) off Marseille at a depth of 60 metres.
Romain Bricoult / CC BY-NC-ND