Author: Jeff Kart / Source: Forbes
An example of stress-testing coral to make reefs more climate change resilient. The coral is exposed to high lights and high heat bleaching experiments in an effort to boost their thermal tolerance and give them a better chance of surviving rising ocean temperatures.
(Emily Michot/Miami Herald/TNS via Getty Images)Coral reefs are on the brink of extinction under a changing climate. So researchers have been working in labs to create more resilient coral that can hopefully survive the warmer ocean waters of the future. Entrepreneurs including a startup called Coral Vita are working alongside scientists on what’s been called “assisted evolution.”
Coral Vita, based in Washington, D.C., is building on efforts by Mote Marine Laboratory in Florida, which has been working for years to plant corals and rebuild a reef near the Looe Key Sanctuary Preservation Area. A formal partnership between Coral Vita and Mote was announced in January.
Eleven years ago, Mote established an underwater coral nursery where scientists grow colonies of the threatened staghorn coral (Acropora cervicornis) for replanting on decimated or damaged sections of reef within the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary, Mote explains in a news release. When the colonies reach a suitable size, small fragments nearly 2 inches long (about 5 cm) are snipped off and used to create a new colony — similar to…
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