Interspecific Aggression Between Reef Corals with Reference to Their Distribution

Spatial competition dynamics between reef corals under ocean acidification

Climate change, including ocean acidification (OA), represents a major threat to coral-reef ecosystems. Although previous experiments have shown that OA can negatively affect the fitness of reef corals, these have not included the long-term effects of competition for space on coral growth rates. Our multispecies year-long study subjected reef-building corals from the Gulf of Aqaba (Red Sea) to ...

Phosphomonoesterases in Reef-Building Corals.

Acclimatization in tropical reef corals

Global climate change (GCC) is the most widespread environmental peril facing tropical coral reefs, yet the capacity of scleractinian corals to survive the challenge is not well understood. Acclimatization is a primary mechanism by which organisms match their physiology in a timely and beneficial way to a rapidly changing environment, and so it is not surprising that the question ‘can corals ac...

Live Tissue Imaging Shows Reef Corals Elevate pH under Their Calcifying Tissue Relative to Seawater

The threat posed to coral reefs by changes in seawater pH and carbonate chemistry (ocean acidification) raises the need for a better mechanistic understanding of physiological processes linked to coral calcification. Current models of coral calcification argue that corals elevate extracellular pH under their calcifying tissue relative to seawater to promote skeleton formation, but pH measuremen...

Interactions between Corals and their Symbiotic Algae

Interactions between Corals and their Symbiotic Algae Gisèle Muller-Parker and Christopher F. D'Elia The mutualistic relationship between corals and their algal endosymbionts is a key factor in the evolutionary success of hermatypic (reef building) corals. Corals that harbor endosymbiotic algae exhibit faster rates of calcification, photoautotrophy and many other attributes that are believed to...