Coral reefs are among the most diverse and valuable ecosystems on the planet. 

They make up a small fraction of our ocean floor, yet the list of reasons why they are important is long. Coral reefs underpin the safety, culture, food, and economic security of almost one billion people. Not to mention, they support more than a quarter of all marine life and play a key role in maintaining a healthy ocean. But in the last 50 years, half of the world’s coral reefs have died in the face of unprecedented climate changes and growing local pressures. Without drastic intervention, experts suggest warming ocean temperatures could bleach these incredible species to death by the end of century. 

To slow the decline of our ocean’s coral reefs, the Paul G. Allen Family Foundation is committing more than $7 million toward research to revolutionize what’s possible in the fight to help corals survive the climate crisis.  

“These grants build on the Foundation’s longstanding commitment to coral reefs,” said Jody Allen, co-founder and chair of the Paul G. Allen Family Foundation. “We are at a critical juncture with coral reefs facing extinction and the world must continue to invest in actionable research that ensures their preservation and long-term survival.” 

Using the latest advances in biomedical science, technology, and coral reef ecology, the foundation is supporting four teams of researchers across the globe answer the essential question – can we find a way for corals to survive long enough for us to act on climate change? 

Finding Nature's 'Super Corals'

The team believes nature’s own “super corals” hold the solutions the world needs to help protect and restore coral reefs. By learning where to find them, researchers say we can better understand the environmental conditions that shape these corals, and uncover the molecular and genetic underpinnings that makes them heat-tolerant. Or in the larger scheme of things, a “climate change survivor.” Identifying them also helps governments, organizations as well as scientists prioritize their colonies for conservation and restoration. But maybe the most important role these corals play is the one that will help their species survive the long-term effects of climate change. As a superior source material for coral restoration, they could potentially improve the resiliency and survival of the next generation. 

“This is a ‘nature does it best’ approach,” said Voolstra. “These ‘super corals’ are solutions nature has evolved, which means they evolved to exist in harmony with the rest of the reef. There’s no unforeseen side effects here.” 

Giving Coral a Helping Hand

To give corals a fighting chance against climate change, we need to accelerate the natural evolution of heat resilient corals so they can help save themselves.  

By manipulating the epigenetics of coral, scientists have shown that they can help coral reefs cope with the impacts of climate change, particularly ocean warming and acidification. Coined human assisted evolution of corals and pioneered by Dr. Madeleine van Oppen from the Australian Institute of Marine Sciences (AIMS) and the late Dr. Ruth Gates at the Hawai’i Institute of Marine Biology (HIMB), this research uses a collection of interventions. From selective breeding to environmental conditioning and the manipulation of algal symbionts, this range of techniques all speed up the naturally occurring evolutionary processes in coral. Considered radical at the time the foundation first invested in this research in 2013, van Oppen and Gates have since revolutionized coral research.

“The world received it as two women with crazy ideas that had too many risks that were never going to work,” said van Oppen. “[The research] has spawned a movement across the world, with now many scientists conducting active research on assisted evolution of corals.” 

The foundation’s previous five years of support helped teams in Australia and Hawai’i develop the infrastructure of this research. In the next phase of investment, both teams will continue to collaborate, but will be focused on two promising approaches.

In Australia, van Oppen’s lab says the key to coral survival might just be in the hands of the single cell algae that live within them. Called algal symbionts, researchers are conditioning them to withstand greater temperatures. After reintroducing these symbionts to corals, van Oppen says early results show this technique is increasing a coral’s heat tolerance. In the new phase of research, van Oppen plans on transplanting these corals in the field for the first time. And since corals naturally expel some of the symbionts, her hope is that these conditioned algae will end up in wild corals creating new breeds of coral that can survive heat and hopefully climate change for years to come. 

Meanwhile, in Hawai’i, Dr. Crawford Drury and the HIMB team are continuing Dr. Gates’ legacy. They are identifying heat resilient corals in the field, breeding them in the lab, and exposing them to anticipated future climate conditions to see how they fare. The most resilient of these juvenile corals will then be transplanted. This is significant because it marks the first time these researchers will be able to monitor the results of selective breeding in the field providing data-driven recommendations for other breeding and restoration programs worldwide. 

“It is imperative that we determine how to support self-recovery and the long-term persistence of reefs,” said Dr. Drury. “Selective breeding is an important step toward achieving this goal.” 

Surviving Us

The plight of coral reefs is caused by the ongoing climate crisis, and while this groundbreaking research helps buy time and works to improve coral resiliency, in the long-term, coral survival is dependent upon human action. For the future of corals, it’s a matter of whether we can act in time.