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AMSTERDAM, Netherlands, Jan. 29 (UPI) -- Rising ocean temperatures are a significant threat to coral. Perhaps second only to phytoplankton, healthy coral communities are one of the most vital components of marine biodiversity.
But coral research has mostly produced bad news recently. Over the last four decades, as much as 80 percent of all coral in the Caribbean has disappeared.
There is a bit of good news, however. For the first time, coral raised in a lab has been successfully integrated into a wild population and reproduced on its own.
"In 2011, offspring of the critically endangered elkhorn coral (Acropora palmata) were reared from gametes collected in the field and were outplanted to a reef one year later," Valerie Chamberland, a coral reef ecologist working at non profit conservation group SECORE, said in a news release.
"In four years, these branching corals have grown to a size of a soccer ball and reproduced, simultaneously with their natural population, in September 2015," Chamberland continued. "This event marks the first ever successful rearing of a threatened Caribbean coral species to its reproductive age."
www.upi.com
But coral research has mostly produced bad news recently. Over the last four decades, as much as 80 percent of all coral in the Caribbean has disappeared.
There is a bit of good news, however. For the first time, coral raised in a lab has been successfully integrated into a wild population and reproduced on its own.
"In 2011, offspring of the critically endangered elkhorn coral (Acropora palmata) were reared from gametes collected in the field and were outplanted to a reef one year later," Valerie Chamberland, a coral reef ecologist working at non profit conservation group SECORE, said in a news release.
"In four years, these branching corals have grown to a size of a soccer ball and reproduced, simultaneously with their natural population, in September 2015," Chamberland continued. "This event marks the first ever successful rearing of a threatened Caribbean coral species to its reproductive age."
Researchers get captive corals to reproduce in the wild - UPI.com
For the first time, coral raised in a lab has been successfully integrated into a wild population and reproduced on its own.
www.upi.com
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