Three decades have passed since the first documented coral bleaching event in the Southwestern Atlantic Ocean. Rising sea surface temperatures continue to threaten coral conservation. Due to particular characteristics of Southwestern Atlantic coral communities, the influence of heat stress on bleaching events remains a challenge. Here, we review reports of coral bleaching over...
Recent studies underscore the critical role of heterotrophy in enhancing the resilience of symbiotic corals to global stressors, such as ocean warming. However, much remains unknown about the role of heterotrophy on coral reproduction, despite its key role in the persistence of coral populations and connectivity. In this study, we experimentally investigated how the trophic...
This study presents the first documented observation of polyp bailout in the red tree coral, Primnoa pacifica, an ecologically important species that forms dense aggregations in the North Pacific. Colonies exposed to environmental and physical stress during a collection event showed polyp detachment, with bailed polyps reattaching to an artificial substrate after two weeks. This...
Chemistry-based net ecosystem calcification and census-based coral reef carbonate budgets are widely used to quantify coral reef growth. However, these studies typically do not capture the full complexity of coral reef growth and suffer from ambiguous terminology, include different processes integrating over different spatiotemporal scales, and use overlapping definitions that...
A diverse array of animals has evolved the ability to use tools (e.g., primates, parrots, octopus, crabs, and wasps), but the factors leading to tool use evolution are poorly understood. Fishes could provide insight into these factors via comparison of ecological and morphological differences between tool-using and non-tool-using species. Anvil use is one example of tool use by...
Anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions increase sea surface temperature and acidification, inhibiting calcification of reef-building corals. While ocean acidification is known to hinder skeletal development of newly settled coral recruits, little is known of its effects on older purebred or interspecific hybrid recruits, or its combined effects with temperature. Using 3D X-ray...
The Great Barrier Reef (GBR) is assumed to be a tectonically stable area, but recent studies show that neotectonic activity could have affected the geomorphology and evolution of the coral reefs. We used bathymetry, free-air gravity and 2D seismic data to test the hypothesis that neotectonic (i.e. geologically recent or currently active) faults have affected the morphology and...
Calcium carbonate production constitutes one of the core processes that drive coral reef ecosystem functioning and can be assessed using in-water or image-based survey methods, which have not previously been compared. This study compares carbonate production estimates from in-water ReefBudget surveys and image-based CoralNet analyses in Puerto Rico, Indonesia, and Chagos...
The crown-of-thorns sea star (COTS, Acanthaster sp.) is a coral predator that, in population outbreaks, causes major coral loss in Indo-Pacific reefs. Current paradigms explaining the cause of outbreaks focus on the larval and adult stages, while the early herbivorous juvenile stage remains a black box in our understanding of COTS. We followed growth in a large laboratory...
The mutualistic relationship between scleractinian corals and dinoflagellate algae (Family Symbiodiniaceae) is critical to the success of corals on tropical reefs yet underpins their vulnerability to climate change. This symbiosis often deteriorates during marine heatwaves as corals rapidly expel their symbionts, inducing mortality unless symbiosis is restored. While symbiont...
Anthropogenic climate change has driven many coral reef ecosystems to the brink of collapse as extreme temperature events cause widespread bleaching and mortality. Interventions that boost coral resilience are being developed to help restore reefs, and one such intervention is the manipulation of a coral’s symbiotic algae (which greatly affects their host’s physiology). New...
Climate-induced ocean warming facilitates the poleward range expansion of tropical marine species into temperate waters. Such tropicalisation is reshaping marine ecosystems globally and has ecological implications. Our understanding of the factors influencing the establishment and persistence of vagrant tropical species in temperate waters remains limited. To address this...
While mesophotic assemblages in the Gulf of Aqaba have been described in some detail, in the Red Sea proper, data are rare. Here we present a first report on a detached carbonate platform fragment from the Northern Red Sea off Al Wajh that stretches over a water depth range of 25 to 130 m. The assemblages observed comprise depth-typical large benthic foraminifers, crustose...
Satellite sea surface temperature (SST) is critical for describing marine environments. Traditional SST data, such as those provided by the Group for High Resolution Sea Surface Temperature (GHRSST) program, are valuable, but have a relatively coarse spatial resolution for mapping coral reef thermal environments. Hence, fine resolution SST from orbit would be of great utility to...
For sessile broadcast spawning marine invertebrates, such as corals, successful sexual reproduction depends on conspecifics spawning synchronously. The precise monthly, lunar, and diel timing and the extent of synchrony, i.e., proportion of population reproducing at the same time, are likely to play a key role in coral population recovery, persistence, and adaptation. Despite its...
Global coral reef restoration efforts continue to diversify in approach, location, and socio-ecological context. In parallel, vocabulary has evolved such that practitioners, scientists, policy makers, communicators, and investors must navigate an increasingly confusing set of terms that are inconsistently defined. Precision around terms and definitions is an important attribute...
Water temperature is a strong driver of growth, survival, and local adaptation in corals, but our knowledge of the temperatures experienced by corals on reefs worldwide remains limited. While in situ temperature loggers can provide high quality data, they are relatively expensive to place and retrieve. Alternatively, remotely sensed sea surface temperature data are globally...
Remote underwater videos (RUVs) are valuable for studying fish assemblages and behaviors, but analyzing them is time-consuming. To effectively extract data from RUVs while minimizing sampling errors, this study developed optimal subsampling strategies for assessing relative abundance, richness, and bite rates of corallivorous fish across eight geographically dispersed reef sites...
Controlling the growth of fouling organisms in coral aquaculture is a recognised approach to enhance survival during grow-out of recruits. Herbivorous fish can reduce algae growth, though indiscriminate grazing by the fish pose a risk to the early life stages of corals. To identify a suitable age or size to introduce fish to coral recruit culture, settlement tiles with 1-week-old...
Reef degradation induced by climate change is motivating interest in active management strategies to retain living coral cover including coral restoration. Understanding the level and range of heat tolerance available in coral populations is critical to determining their viability and may be important in choosing corals to propagate for restoration projects. There is a need to...
Animal holobionts constitute diverse yet interconnected landscapes of microenvironments that harbor specific bacterial communities with distinct functions. An increasing body of literature suggests a partitioning and distinct functional profiles of bacterial communities across shark microenvironments, which has led to the proposition that beneficial bacterial functions may...
Potential range expansion of scleractinian corals in high-latitude reefs is critically dependent on the coral host-symbiont relationship that determines coral growth and survival. Although increases in coral cover have been observed at higher latitudes, the identities of habitat-building reef corals and their symbionts are underreported. Here, we examine how scleractinian host...