Proposed Session: Scientific support for coral reef restoration efforts in Biscayne Bay, Florida.

Interventions to save coral reefs are deemed critical and urgent to protect these exceptional ecosystems and those who depend on them. Increasing losses in ecosystem services including coastal protection, fisheries resources, and support for tourism and cultural practices have demonstrated the need for well designed and implemented restoration programs. New molecular tools in the disciplines of genomics, proteomics, metabolomics and transcriptomics can help guide restoration activities and provide a basis for evaluating program efficacy. Such data can be combined with modeling to test alternative management scenarios and also aid in the design and evaluation of restoration targets and efforts. Advances in the techniques for the translocation of corals and zooxanthellae also offer hope that interventions can be applied to address local and global level stressors affecting coral reef health and resilience. Criteria for the selection of wild and brood stock and the cultivation of resistant variants that can survive anthropogenic stressors are essential for the success of restoration efforts and associated interventions. Protein expression is a valuable tool for diagnosing specific local stressors of highest concern, and the genotypes of corals most likely to survive. The Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) and Gene Ontology (GO) databases are now usable to help guide interventions for corals. Genetic analyses can determine those genotypes with inherent resistance to individual and multiple stressors, and transcriptomic data can provide critical information on gene expression in response to changing environmental conditions. The Florida Keys and Biscayne Bay provide an appropriate set of sites for the testing and application of these techniques. To make the most of limited financial, institutional and human resources that can be devoted to coral reef restoration, the application of modeling and molecular tools can be foundational in the design, implementation and evaluation of such activities.