Category five Hurricanes Irma and María (2017) caused extensive devastation of shallow coral reef assemblages across the Northeast Reserves System Habitat Focus Area (NER-HFA) of Culebra Island, Puerto Rico. These caused coral colony fragmentation and dislodgment across multiple species, and the ne...

Caribbean ecosystem with its diverse habitat is a goldmine for biologists, environmentalists and tourists. While the coral reefs hold extensive value as they are hotspots for diverse species, the Biogenic reefs with the sandcastle worm add to their survival. These are the Sabellariid polychaetes tha...

Researchers were tasked with developing a novel method of antibiotic delivery to a submerged mucosal membrane over an extended release profile between 15-72 hours to be used for field application on scleractinian corals affected by Stony Coral Tissue Loss Disease. Studies were conducted using dissol...

Coral reefs are in rapid decline around the world, particularly in the two Caribbean species Acropora palmata and Orbicella faveolata. These species are stony corals that have been unable to reproduce and grow fast enough to keep up with the recent bleaching events and outbreaks of disease. Coral mi...

Microbiota response within reef invertebrates potentially play a critical role in the holobionts environmental acclimation and ultimately the persistence of populations faced with future ocean acidification and warming. This study aimed to establish the microbial communities associated with early de...

Active coral reef restoration is a fast-growing area of research around the world. The largest projects emerged from a need to accelerate the repopulation of threatened species in the Caribbean. With the increasing threat of climate change, restoration is rapidly becoming a platform for incorporatin...

Global warming, and the resultant coral bleaching events, are now considered the greatest threat to the long-term sustainability of coral reefs. Alongside the challenge of mitigating globally driven change is the potential for cumulative and synergistic impacts of local stressors such as run-off, po...

The ability to predict metabolic deficits in coral holobiont metabolism is becoming increasingly important as water temperatures continue to rise. Physiological sensitivities to acute and cumulative thermal stress were compared in Acropora cervicornis from Broward County, Florida. Dark-adapted chlor...

Hurricanes play a fundamental role in shaping coral reef benthic and fish communities. Long-term degradation and loss of ecosystem persistence and resilience may drive reefs into a permanent state of mediocrity. Mediocre reefs are characterized by slow but progressive homogenization, which may invol...

The goal of coral reef restoration is not only to enhance coral populations, but also to recover and sustain the diverse fish communities that rely on reef habitat and ecosystem services. The sequence in which species colonize new habitat is often an important determinant of long-term community stru...

Coral reefs have degraded drastically in recent decades. The impact of anthropogenic activities, in synergy with the effects of global climate change, has led to the decrease of coral coverage and the loss of roughness of the calcareous matrix, which reduces the three-dimensional structure of the re...

Anthropogenic structures submerged in the sea over thousands of years provide hard and longstanding evidence of human influence in the marine environment. Many of these structures were created for purposes such as fishing or tourism, but they may also provide unique opportunities for conservation. T...

The Coral Restoration Foundation Curaçao (CRFC) was founded in 2015 as a non-profit organization, with missions “(a) to promote awareness of coral reef health and survival and the environmental and social benefits of reef ecosystems; (b) to engage communities in nursery and restoration efforts by...

Coral reef restoration is gaining considerable momentum globally in response to the threat of climate change and associated coral bleaching. In Australia, as part of the Reef Restoration and Adaptation Program (RRAP), a range of interventions are currently being investigated to help the Great Barrie...

Globally, coral reefs are in decline. The intensity and frequency of disturbances have pushed coral reefs close to their thermal tolerance limit, causing over half of the world’s coral to die (Hughes et al., 2018). Yet, coral reefs form the foundations of the most diverse marine ecosystem on th...