Persian Gulf extremophile corals can tolerate temperatures far higher - and lower - than open ocean corals. But we totally have to spend millions breeding new corals which can replicate this feat.
Scientists hope planting Palau's 'super corals' will save reefs from climate change
By Hugo Hodge
Sat 6 Sep
Palau's idyllic waters hide an experiment that scientists hope will save the world's reefs from climate change-induced collapse.
At an outer reef, ceramic cribs are holding thousands of baby corals growing underwater.
They're "super corals", selectively bred to survive hotter ocean temperatures.
And they're providing hope in global efforts to stop marine heatwaves from wiping out reefs.
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"Hopefully they'll be able to grow and we'll be able to tell if they're able to withstand the next coral bleaching event here in Palau," Lauren Piot, a French-American researcher at the Palau International Coral Reef Centre (PICRC), says.
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However, there are doubts they're being deployed fast enough and can withstand increasingly severe marine heatwaves into the future.
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Back in the real world, such corals already exist, and the scientists who study them have already proposed such corals could be used to save other reefs if global warming ever threatens corals;
MARCH 3, 2015
Hot Water Corals in the Persian Gulf Could Help Save the World's Reefs
The species may hold genetic clues that could help reefs worldwide adapt to warmer ocean temperatures
BY MICHAEL CASEY
Just down the road from the world's tallest tower, in the shadow of monster sand dunes, marine biologists from around the world clamored onboard a boat for a visit to some of the Persian Gulf's coral reefs.
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Most coral reefs in temperate climates can withstand temperatures only as high as 29 degrees Celsius before they bleach -- a process in which corals expel their symbiotic algae living in their tissue, causing them to turn white and increasing their vulnerability to disease and death. Corals in the Persian Gulf reefs, however, typically tolerate temperatures as high as 36 degrees C during summer and as low as 13 degrees C in winter. "These temperatures exceed what we are expecting anywhere else in the world in the tropics over the next century," says John Burt, a marine biologist at a branch of New York University in the Emirates, who led the reef tour in 2012. Burt also helped organize an international conference in February on Persian Gulf reefs at NYU, which brought together 250 scientists. The Persian Gulf corals "offer hope," he says. Some of the genetic mechanisms they use could help others survive these extreme temperatures.
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Persian gulf corals can handle temperature extremes, along the pollution and turbidity which comes from being located in one of the world's busiest shipping lanes. But I'm sure, you know, they're too Persian or something, because it is obviously absolutely necessary for well funded reef scientists to ignore natural reservoirs of extremophile corals and spend millions of taxpayer dollars breeding their own varieties.
Do I need a /sarc tag?
Before you think it's just Australian money being blown on this absurd and pointless project, the Biden administration also threw some cash at South Pacific coral resilience projects, including Palau. I mean why wouldn't they? Biden threw taxpayer cash at everything else with the word "climate" in it.