A 90-year sea level record (1930-2019) is constructed from the growth of a tropical coral and reveals a marked acceleration in sea-level rise in the central Indian Ocean beginning in 1959 (3.44 ± 0.68...

As climate change continues to unfold with alarming rapidity, its impacts resonate across the globe, leaving no ecosystem untouched. One of the most devastated environments is underwater ecosystems,

The planet is grappling with a “new reality” as it reaches the first in a series of catastrophic and potentially irreversible climate tipping points: the widespread death of coral reefs, according to ...

A new imaging system developed at Scripps allows researchers to see coral polyps and their algae symbionts like never before, offering insights that could help save reefs before they vanish.

A lab at the California Academy of Sciences is creating a lifeline for dying coral.

Scientific Reports - Coral restoration can drive rapid increases in reef accretion potential

Beneath a cloak of darkness, illuminated only by glow sticks and red-filtered flashlights, researchers waited underwater off Key Largo hoping to witness one of the rarest events of sex in the sea.

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Genomic data have revealed that traditional coral taxonomy based on skeletal morphology does not accurately reflect the true diversity of, or systematic relationships within, the order Scleractinia. Here, we apply an integrated taxonomic approach combining molecular analysis and morphological comparison of type material with specimens collected from across the Indo-Pacific to revise the taxonomy of a clade within the species-rich and ecologically dominant reef coral genus Acropora, which includes the species Acropora hyacinthus (Dana, 1846) and related species (termed the ‘hyacinthus species complex’). Using a collection of specimens comprising preserved tissues, field images and skeletal vouchers collected from 22 regions spanning the Indian and Pacific Oceans, we generated a phylogenomic reconstruction using targeted capture of ultraconserved elements (UCEs) and exons, combined with examination of morphological characters, to generate primary species hypotheses (PSHs) for the clade. We then tested PSHs by calling Single Nucleotide Polymorphism (SNPs) from the genomic dataset to provide additional lines of evidence to support the delineation of species within the clade and revise the taxonomy of the group. Our integrated approach recovered 16 lineages sufficiently delineated to be designated as distinct species. Based on comparison of our specimens to type material and geographical distributions, we remove nine species from synonymy: A. turbinata (Verrrill, 1864), A. surculosa (Dana, 1846), A. patella (Studer, 1878), A. flabelliformis (Milne-Edwards, 1860), A. conferta (Quelch, 1886), A pectinata (Brook, 1892), A. recumbens (Brook, 1892), A. sinensis (Brook, 1893) and A. bifurcata Nemenzo, 1971. We also describe five new species: A. harriottae sp. nov. from south-eastern Australia, A. tersa sp. nov. from eastern Australia and the Western Pacific, A. nyinggulu sp. nov. from the eastern Indian Ocean, Indo-Australian Archipelago and southern Japan, A. uogi sp. nov. from the western Pacific and A. kalindae sp. nov. from north-eastern Australia. Our data reveal that the species richness within this clade of Acropora is far greater than currently assumed due to both overlooked provincialism across the Indo-Pacific as well as lumping of distinct sympatric species based on superficial morphological similarity. Given the key ecological role tabular Acropora play on Indo-Pacific reefs our findings have significant implications for reef conservation and management, for example, A. harriottae sp. nov. is restricted to a small geographical region of south-eastern Australia and is therefore at comparatively high risk of extinction. ZooBank: urn:lsid:zoobank.org:pub:6C42546C-9253-4639-9FF4-D8D80808D78C

The accelerating loss of coral reefs worldwide due to anthropogenic climate change has led to a myriad of studies aimed at understanding the basis of coral resilience to support reef conservation. Her...

Communications Earth & Environment - Large seasonal temperature variability exacerbated the negative effects of reduced carbonate saturation on coral calcification during the mid-Miocene,...

Wellington’s solitary coral, a species thought to be extinct for more than two decades, was rediscovered in 2024 near Tagus Cove in Ecuador’s Galápagos Islands, according to a recent study.  Over mult...