Coral

A recent meeting of minds in Denmark saw scientists and politicians alike acknowledge that global emissions of carbon dioxide (CO₂) are rising so fast that we are losing the fight to save the coral reef and most reefs will not survive even if tough greenhouse gas regulations are implemented.

Preserving samples of coral species in liquid nitrogen would enable scientists to reintroduce them to the seas in the future – if global temperatures can be stabilised by then.

A black deepsea coral found about 400 meters from Oahu and the Big Island in Hawaii is more than 4,000 years old — making it the oldest marine organism ever found, according to researchers from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Stanford University and the University of California, Santa Cruz.

Using a manned deep-sea research submersible samples were collected at the Makapuu and Lanikai deep-sea coral beds off the coast of Oahu, Keahole Point deep-sea coral bed off the coast of the Big Island and Cross Seamount about 100 miles south of Oahu.

This affliction etches a swath of pale-yellow or white lesions along the surface of an infected coral colony. The discoloured band is a mark of death, indicating where the bacterial infection has killed the coral’s photosynthetic symbionts, called zooxanthellae. The coral host suffers from cellular damage and starves without its major energy source, and usually does not recover.