coral reefs

Mention the phrase "diverse ecosystem," and it conjures images of tropical rainforests and endangered coral reefs.

It also describes the human colon. A new study reveals in greater detail than ever before the full extent of the bacterial community inhabiting the human bowel -- 10 times more diverse than previous research had suggested.

When reef fish get a mouthful of sand, coral reefs can drown. "We've known for a while that having a lot of sediment in the water is bad for corals and can smother them.

What we didn't realize is how permanent this state of affairs can become, to the point where it may prevent the corals ever re-establishing."

The roadmap to the future of the gorgeously-decorated fish which throng Australia’s coral reefs may well be written in their genes.

Of particular importance may be to protect ‘pioneer’ fish populations which are able to re-colonize regions of reef devastated by global warming and other impacts or settle new areas as the corals move south.

Conservation zones are in the wrong place to protect vulnerable coral reefs from the effects of global warming, an international team of scientists warned today.

Now the team say that urgent action is needed to prevent the collapse of this important marine ecosystem.

No-take marine reserves where fishing is banned can have benefits that extend beyond the exploited fishes they are specifically designed to protect, according to new evidence from Australia's Great Barrier Reef.

Researchers have found that outbreaks of large, predatory crown-of-thorns starfish, which can devastate coral reefs although they don't yet know exactly why.

Hurricanes and storms limit the ability of corals in Belize to "recruit" new coral into their communities, according to a new study in Marine Environmental Research.

Coral reefs --- which can grow to be thousands of years old --- form and grow when free-swimming coral larvae in the ocean attach to rocks or other hard surfaces and begin to develop.

Intense storms can wipe out this "recruitment" process.

Scientists have developed a new model that accurately maps where coral reefs are in the most trouble, and identifies regions where reefs can be protected best.

The model is being applied in areas throughout the Indian Ocean.

Recognizing an urgent need to increase awareness and understanding of coral reefs, and to further conserve and manage valuable reef ecosystems, the International Coral Reef Initiative (ICRI) designated 2008 as the International Year of the Reef.

Coral reefs could be dying out because of changes to the microbes that live in them just as much as from the direct rise in temperature caused by global warming, according to scientists.

Tropical ecosystems are currently balanced on a climate change knife edge.

An ambitious expedition to a chain of little-known islands in the central Pacific Ocean has yielded an unprecedented wealth of information about coral reefs and threats from human activities.

The exploration of four atolls in the Line Islands, part of a chain approximately a thousand miles south of Hawaii, has produced the first study of coral reefs comprehensively spanning organisms from microbes to sharks.