“I have been working on breeding corals in the Caribbean over the past thirty years, while simultaneously watching the reef communities unravel due to coral loss,” says Dr. Margaret Miller, SECORE's Research Director. “Our success provides a lot of encouragement and confirmation that restoration using assisted coral recruits can play an important role in orchestrating their persistence into our warmer future in the face of climate change"
"Assisted sexual coral recruits show high thermal tolerance to the 2023 Caribbean mass bleaching event.", PLOSone, Miller et al 2024
Our scientists study the corals’ life cycle to better understand how to breed them. We translate scientific findings into breeding methods and applications, and our scientists play a critical part in creating innovative approaches and technologies together with engineers and partners. SECORE stands for SExual COral REproduction, and our Coral Seeding approach takes advantage of the corals’ own reproduction potential, thus promoting genetic diversity and enabling mass production of coral larvae respectively.
So far, we and our partners are working with 12 reef-building coral species for restoration, with eight more being propagated at research level. We are working to recruit more species for breeding, including more resilient species that have separate male and female colonies and require adapted collection techniques.
Normally, coral settlement substrates are preconditioned in reef water to develop a biofilm and be colonized by certain calcareous algae that tell the coral larvae that this is the right place to settle. With our academic partners, we are investigating how reef sounds and certain substances can trigger or promote settlement, reducing labor-intensive preconditioning.
When restoring coral populations, we aim to include those corals that have the best chance of surviving stressful conditions. In collaboration with academic colleagues, SECORE is involved in researching different approaches aimed at actively improving the ability of restored corals to withstand warmer, more stressful conditions. Any application of these findings will involve coral breeding to put such corals out on reefs.
Targeted feeding of coral recruits shortly after they have turned into coral polyps - e.g. usually while they are still in the CRIB – has shown to significantly improve the corals’ growth and thus their chances of survival. Field trials show promising ways of applying early feeding effectively and with little investment for practical use. A kickstart is an invaluable advantage for coral offspring these days
We are investigating how other organisms can support the growing corals. In our Fire Wall project, we are investigating the positive influence of fire corals on the survival and growth performance of corals. Grazing sea urchins also support the development of small corals by minimizing competing algae. We are investigating how we can grow different organisms together with corals for mutual benefit.
The Florida X-Reefs project (Reefense Program funded by DARPA) piloted the development of ecological technology for costal protection. Our Research Director Dr. Margaret Miller co-lead the research on establishing a temperature-resistant, fast-growing coral community, while our Lead Engineer Miles McGonigle spearheads innovative technologies to enable practical implementation later on.
Dr. Valérie Chamberland, our Research Scientist on Curaçao, led a distinguished panel of experts to distill comprehensive knowledge on coral breeding into a practical resource. The Coral Breeding Reference Sheets are designed to guide practitioners in the application of Coral Seeding.
The Coral Breeding Reference Sheets provide practitioners with necessary knowledge about coral spawning, larval development, settlement, and the post-settlement period for four important Caribbean coral species we work with: Acropora palmata, Orbicella faveolata, Diploria labyrinthiformis, and Porites porites.
Assisted sexual coral recruits show high thermal tolerance to the 2023 Caribbean mass bleaching event. Margaret W. Miller, Sandra Mendoza Quiroz, Liam Lachs, Anastazia T. Banaszak, Valérie F. Chamberland, James R. Guest, Alexandra N. Gutting, Kelly R. W. Latijnhouwers, Rita I. Sellares-Blasco, Francesca Virdis, Maria F. Villalpando, Dirk Petersen.
The sea urchin Diadema antillarum facilitates recruitment of the critically endangered Caribbean coral species Acropora palmata. Kelly R. W. Latijnhouwers, M. van Aalst, J. Huckeba, Margaret W. Miller, Mark J.A. Vermeij, Valérie F. Chamberland. Marine Ecology Progress Series
Sediment source and dose influence the larval performance of the threatened coral Orbicella faveolate. Xaymara M. Serrano , Stephanie M. Rosales, Margaret W. Miller, Ana M. Palacio-Castro, Olivia M. Williamson, Andrea Gomez, Andrew C. Baker.
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