Coral reefs are the most diverse of all marine ecosystems. They teem with life, with about one-quarter of all ocean species depending on reefs for food and shelter at some point in their lifecycle.

Two key coral reefs in Florida are “functionally extinct” following the 2023 heatwave, warns a new scientific study.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Written by Danielle DeLeo, postdoctoral associate in biological sciences at FIU. Our research focuses on octocorals ...

Coral reefs are both beautiful and utterly vital to the ocean ecosystem and the local environment. They provide homes, food and breeding sites for millions of marine plants and animals, including the ...

In a race against time, scientists are exploring new ways to restore natural systems. Alongside traditional methods such as planting trees, reducing pollution and reintroducing native species, a ...

Kim Stone, director of fish and invertebrates at the Georgia Aquarium, holds a colony of confiscated marine corals in a back room of the aquarium, in Atlanta, May 23, 2024. You might imagine that when ...

Some corals produce chemicals called diterpenoids that have shown promise in fighting cancer and reducing inflammation, but researchers have been unable to study the chemicals in depth. The problem is ...

In an underwater nursery just off the Dominican Republic coast, tiny corals born in a laboratory are slowly growing under the eye of conservationists ...

This is especially worrying because these massive corals are normally quite resilient to heat stress. Even the strong are now struggling to survive.

Our planet’s coral reefs, the ‘rainforests of the sea,’ are facing a serious threat, necessitating urgent restoration. With the introduction of drones designed to plant corals on a large scale, we’ve ...

Andrea Quattrini receives funding from Smithsonian Institution, National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration Office of Ocean Exploration, and the National Science Foundation. Danielle DeLeo does not ...