Water Worlds: Revitalizing Diminishing Underwater Communities

While coral reefs may seem like merely beautiful oceanic landscape, they are actually worlds unto themselves – providing food and shelter and sustaining ecosystems of countless species that thrive on the coral-built structures. Often compared, in value, to rain forests, their beauty attracts tourism that sustains coastal economies. Their structure buffers, protecting coastlines from storm activity. And the uniqueness of this environment certainly harbors equally unique organisms – some known, many more still to be identified.

Unfortunately, both man-made and natural factors have played into coral reef destruction. Facing threats from El Niño, heat stress, disease, and hurricane wave forces to ship groundings, sediment runoff, and dynamite and chemical fishing, it’s not easy to be a coral reef. It has been reported that 20 percent of the world’s coral reefs have been effectively, and possibly permanently, destroyed. Without question, recovery will be extremely challenging, so Rosenstiel School coral reef researchers are working to learn more about this rare and special ecosystem.

Coral reef health
Coral reefs are facing a global decline. The consensus is that the corals today are not as healthy or as diverse as they were 50 years ago. Most scientists point to increased exploitation of reef resources or other negative, human-induced influences as the cause for this change. However, there are more myths than truths. Are corals declining because of pollution in the form of toxic chemicals from nearby human populations? Is the global increase in temperature causing the corals to bleach more often? Is the increasing amount of nutrients being delivered to the reef also promoting the overgrowth of algae? Is the increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide causing the oceans to become more acidic? These are the ideas being studied at Rosenstiel School to better protect the valuable and mysteriously beautiful coral reefs.

Watching coral grow
Several Rosenstiel School researchers have focused specifically on monitoring the health of Caribbean corals. They estimate age and partial mortality by coral species and analyze the abundance or lack of symbiotic algae. Most recently, these scientists have studied how various coral species interact. While they seem like immobile rocks to the untrained observer, coral spawning and algae expulsion in response to warm water temperatures and prior to bleaching, disperse DNA, pathogens, or other material with unclear consequences. To learn more about the factors that help coral grow and thrive, Rosenstiel School scientists have cultivated more than 20 species of important reef-building corals in their labs. It’s their success and failures at sustaining these species that will help them learn more about what affects coral growth, development, resistance, and resilience.

Predicting the impact of disease
Coral reef decline stems from many causes, including disease. However, it is difficult to assess the impact of this disease without quantitative models. Rosenstiel School scientists are providing exactly that. They start with literature surveys that detail the dynamics and distribution of disease and follow up with field work to calibrate a model. Ultimately, this modeling will provide new opportunitites to examine several aspects of coral disease.

Assisting the coral reef caretakers
If a hurricane sweeps through the area, what happens to our coral reefs? How do Florida officials decide whether a “no-take” zone would be beneficial to the coral reefs? How does a marine life sanctuary evaluate if it’s having an impact? A unique, new, user-friendly, online tool called Data Navigator: South Florida is one of the most recent additions to Rosenstiel School’s complement of coral reef research tools. It provides ready access to literally several hundred digital layers of environmental and socioeconomic information via maps, charts, and databases and allows users to combine this data in ways that make, as clear as possible, the potential impacts of a disturbance or change in regulations in one part of the ecosystem on other parts of the reef, and on the people to whom the reef is important.

Because this tool is available on the Internet (http://www.ncoremiami.org), anyone can access it, allowing for better understanding among coral reef enthusiasts and caretakers.

Managing coral reef ecosystems is complex, with countless variables factoring into their health. With its broad range of research tools and approaches, Rosenstiel School seeks to reduce the threats to these unique water worlds.

For more information, contact:
Barbra Gonzalez, Communications Director
Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science
305.421.4704 • barbgo@rsmas.miami.edu

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