In an effort to create hybrid reefs, researchers and students from the University of Miami ventured into the murky waters a few miles offshore this week.
The Rosenstiel School of Marine, Atmospheric and Earth Science team was sent on a mission to gather sperm and eggs from spawning staghorn coral in order to fertilise other strains of staghorn coral in a laboratory.
All of this is a part of a federal award of $7.5 million from the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency to assist in addressing security risks to the military and civilian infrastructure along vulnerable coastal regions in Florida and the Caribbean.
The Miami-based project seeks to protect coastal bases from damaging hurricane storm surge using hybrid reefs.
The goal of the Coral Reef Futures Lab, led by professor Andrew Baker, at the Rosenstiel School is to create hybrid reefs that combine the ecological advantages of coral reefs with the wave-protection advantages of artificial structures. ‘To encourage the growth of corals on these structures, we will be working on next generation structural designs and concrete materials, and merging them with unique ecological engineering methodologies.’
‘They will also be testing new adaptive biology approaches to produce corals that are faster-growing and more resilient to a warming climate,’ he said.
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