'Coral Zombies' May Spell Doom for Coral Reefs Around World
http://today.ucf.edu/73033-2/[font face=Serif][font size=5]'Coral Zombies' May Spell Doom for Coral Reefs Around World[/font]
By zkotala
Tuesday, June 21, 2016
[font size=3]Scientists have known for a while that coral reefs around the world are dying, and in a worst-case scenario they were counting on large, healthy-looking corals to repopulate.
But a new study presented at the
13th International Coral Reef Symposium in Honolulu today shows that these seemingly healthy colonies are Coral Zombies with no reproductive ability, which makes them useless in a recovery effort.
Its pretty discouraging, said University of Central Florida biologist John E. Fauth, one of the researchers who sampled 34 sites across the Caribbean for the study. This is not good news.
This study adds to growing evidence that coral reefs frequented by divers are in peril. Last year a study (
http://today.ucf.edu/lathering-up-with-sunscreen-may-protect-against-cancer-killing-coral-reefs-worldwide/) found that oxybenzone, a common UV-filtering compound in sunscreen, is in high concentrations in the waters around the more popular coral reefs in Hawaii and the Caribbean. The chemical not only kills coral, it causes DNA damage in adult corral and deforms the larval stage, making it unlikely they can develop properly. The highest concentrations of oxybenzone were found in reefs most popular with tourists. Fauth was a co-investigator of that 2015 study, which was published in the journal
Archives of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology.
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