Coral Reefs News

November 15, 2025

Top Headlines

Deep-sea Mining Starves Life in the Ocean’s Twilight Zone

Nov. 8, 2025 Scientists have discovered that deep-sea mining plumes can strip vital nutrition from the ocean’s twilight zone, replacing natural food with nutrient-poor sediment. The resulting “junk food” effect could starve life across entire marine ...

Earth Has Hit Its First Climate Tipping Point, Scientists Warn

Oct. 29, 2025 Global scientists warn that humanity is on the verge of crossing irreversible climate thresholds, with coral reefs already at their tipping point and polar ice sheets possibly beyond recovery. The Global Tipping Points Report 2025 reveals how rising ...

Scientists Just Found Out How Corals Rebuild Themselves on the Reef

Oct. 29, 2025 Researchers at QUT uncovered how corals reattach to reefs through a three-phase process involving tissue transformation, anchoring, and skeleton formation. Differences among species reveal why some corals grow and attach faster than others. ...

Earth’s Climate Just Crossed a Line We Can’t Ignore

Oct. 13, 2025 Humanity has reached the first Earth system tipping point, the widespread death of warm-water coral reefs, marking the beginning of irreversible planetary shifts. As global temperatures move beyond 1.5°C, the world risks cascading crises such as ...

Ocean Heatwaves Are Breaking Earth’s Hidden Climate Engine

Oct. 7, 2025 Marine heatwaves can jam the ocean’s natural carbon conveyor belt, preventing carbon from reaching the deep sea. Researchers studying two major heatwaves in the Gulf of Alaska found that plankton shifts caused carbon to build up near the surface ...

Even the Toughest Corals Are Shrinking in Warming Seas

Sep. 5, 2025 Scientists found that Red Sea corals can endure warming seas but grow much smaller and weaken under long-term heat stress. Though recovery is possible in cooler months, rising global temperatures may outpace their resilience, endangering reefs and ...

Maui’s Fires Drove a 67% Jump in Deaths. Most Went Uncounted

Aug. 25, 2025 Researchers uncovered that the Maui wildfires caused a spike in deaths far higher than reported, with hidden fatalities linked to fire, smoke, and lack of medical access. They warn that prevention rooted in Native Hawaiian ecological knowledge is ...

Protected Seas Help Kelp Forests Bounce Back from Heatwaves

Aug. 20, 2025 Kelp forests bounce back faster from marine heatwaves when shielded inside Marine Protected Areas. UCLA researchers found that fishing restrictions and predator protection strengthen ecosystem resilience, though results vary by ...

Deep-sea Fish Just Changed What We Know About Earth’s Carbon Cycle

July 27, 2025 Mesopelagic fish, long overlooked in ocean chemistry, are now proven to excrete carbonate minerals much like their shallow-water counterparts—despite living in dark, high-pressure depths. Using the deep-dwelling blackbelly rosefish, researchers ...

The Heatwave That Shattered Ecosystems, Starved Whales, and Drove Fish North

July 21, 2025 A scorching marine heatwave from 2014 to 2016 devastated the Pacific coast, shaking ecosystems from plankton to whales and triggering mass die-offs, migrations, and fishery collapses. Researchers ...

Corals in Crisis: A Hidden Chemical Shift Is Reshaping Hawaiian Reefs

July 16, 2025 Hawaiian coral reefs may face unprecedented ocean acidification within 30 years, driven by carbon emissions. A new study by University of Hawai‘i researchers shows that even under conservative climate scenarios, nearshore waters will change more ...

Geological Time Capsule Highlights Great Barrier Reef's Resilience

June 2, 2025 New research adds to our understanding of how rapidly rising sea levels due to climate change foreshadow the end of the Great Barrier Reef as we know it. The findings suggest the reef can withstand rising sea levels in isolation but is vulnerable to ...

Latest Headlines

updated 2:02pm EST

Small Currents, Big Impact: Satellite Breakthrough Reveals Hidden Ocean Forces

May 30, 2025 While scientists have long studied currents of large eddies, the smaller ones -- called submesoscale eddies -- are notoriously difficult to detect. ...

A Cheap and Easy Potential Solution for Lowering Carbon Emissions in Maritime Shipping

May 29, 2025 Reducing travel speeds and using an intelligent queuing system at busy ports can reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from oceangoing container ...

Huge Sea-Urchin Populations Are Overwhelming Hawaii's Coral Reefs

May 28, 2025 This study measured the growth rate of coral reefs in Honaunau Bay, Hawaii, using on-site data gathering and aerial imagery. Researchers found that the reefs are being eroded by sea urchin ...

MIT Scientists Develop Tool That Makes Underwater Scenes Crystal Clear

May 21, 2025 MIT and WHOI scientists have unveiled SeaSplat, a system that makes underwater scenes look as if the ocean had been drained away. The tool cancels out water’s distortions and builds true-color 3D ...

Heat-Tolerant Symbionts a Critical Key to Protecting Florida's Elkhorn Coral from Bleaching During Marine Heatwaves

May 16, 2025 A new study reveals that heat-tolerant symbiotic algae may be essential to saving elkhorn coral (Acropora palmata) -- a foundational species in ...

Scientists Use Fossils to Assess the Health of Florida's Largest Remaining Seagrass Bed: Surprisingly, It's Doing Well!

May 16, 2025 A new study shows that seagrass ecosystems along the northern half of Florida's Gulf Coast have remained relatively healthy and undisturbed for the ...

Tiny Gas Bubbles Reveal Secrets of Hawaiian Volcanoes

May 14, 2025 Using advanced technology that analyzes tiny gas bubbles trapped in crystal, a team of scientists has precisely mapped how magma storage evolves as Hawaiian volcanoes ...

An Ink That Boosts Coral Reef Settlement by 20 Times

May 14, 2025 With coral reefs in crisis due to climate change, scientists have engineered a bio-ink that could help promote coral larvae settlement and restore these underwater ecosystems before it's too late. ...

Halo Patterns Around Coral Reefs May Signal Resilience

May 8, 2025 A new study links grazing halo patterns in coral reefs, as well as those in other patchy habitats, to the spatial patterns of the shelter habitat itself. The researchers found that grazing halos are ...

Artificial Oxygen Supply in Coastal Waters: A Hope With Risks

May 5, 2025 Could the artificial introduction of oxygen revitalise dying coastal waters? While oxygenation approaches have already been proven successful in lakes, their potential side effects must be carefully ...

Extreme Monsoon Changes Threaten the Bay of Bengal's Role as a Critical Food Source

Apr. 28, 2025 New research has revealed that expected, extreme changes in India's summer monsoon could drastically hamper the Bay of Bengal's ability to support a crucial element of the region's ...

Coral Reefs Exude Myriad Chemicals, Fueling Dynamic Microbial Recycling of Nutrients

Apr. 9, 2025 New research revealed the remarkable chemical diversity of substances exuded by coral reefs and demonstrated that thousands of different chemicals derived from tropical corals and seaweeds are ...

Restoration Programs Won’t Save Coral Reefs

Apr. 8, 2025 As coral bleaching and deaths become more widespread globally, experts show that over a third of restoration projects fail and might never be scalable enough to have positive effects on reef ...

Coral Diseases and Water Quality Play a Key Role for Coral Restoration and Survival Efforts

Mar. 26, 2025 Coral diseases, particularly in the Caribbean, have caused major declines in coral populations, especially affecting staghorn (Acropora cervicornis) and Elkhorn (A. palmata) corals, which play a ...

Red Coral Colonies Survive a Decade After Being Transplanted in the Medes Islands

Mar. 18, 2025 The red coral colonies that were transplanted a decade ago on the seabed of the Medes Islands have survived successfully. They are very similar to the original communities and have contributed to the ...

'Fishial' Recognition: Neural Network Identifies Coral Reef Sounds

Mar. 11, 2025 Researchers combine acoustic monitoring with a neural network to identify fish activity on coral reefs by sound. They trained the network to sort through the deluge of acoustic data automatically, ...

Adaptability of Some Coral Reef Fish to Rising Temperatures

Mar. 6, 2025 Researchers have found that reef fish from the Arabian Gulf, the world's hottest sea, exhibit a higher tolerance to temperature fluctuations compared to those from more thermally stable coral ...

Shark Activity in South African Reef Revealed by Citizen Scientist Scuba Divers

Feb. 26, 2025 Shark sightings by scuba divers reveal the movements of marine predators throughout the year, according to a new ...

Heat-Stressed Reefs May Benefit from Coral-Dwelling Crabs

Feb. 24, 2025 Crab behavior suggestive of wound-tending may improve coral tolerance to heat ...

10 New Sponge Species Near Hawaii

Feb. 20, 2025 Biologists, using a technique that explores both genes and structural characteristics, have introduced 10 new species of marine sponge. Despite their distinction as one of Earth's oldest ...

Foraging Seals Enable Scientists to Measure Fish Abundance Across the Vast Pacific Ocean

Feb. 13, 2025 A new study by marine biologists reports that seals can essentially act as 'smart sensors' for monitoring fish populations in the ocean's eerily dim 'twilight ...

Can Artificial Intelligence Save the Great Barrier Reef?

Feb. 12, 2025 Researchers are designing a global real-time monitoring system to help save the world's coral reefs from further decline, primarily due to bleaching caused by global ...

California's Marine Protected Areas Boost Fish Populations Across the State

Feb. 10, 2025 It's 1999, the 21st century is on the horizon, and California has big plans for marine conservation. New legislation has presented a mandate to establish an ambitious network of marine protected ...

New Technology Lights Way for Accelerating Coral Reef Restoration

Feb. 6, 2025 Scientists have developed a novel tool designed to protect and conserve coral reefs by providing them with an abundance of feeding ...

'Marine Prosperity Areas' Represent a New Hope in Conservation

Feb. 6, 2025 An international team of researchers introduces a promising new initiative in marine conservation, dubbed 'Marine Prosperity Areas.' This science-informed effort goes beyond protecting ...

Fishing and Conserving in Great Barrier Reef's Marine Reserves

Feb. 5, 2025 A new study of the Great Barrier Reef has revealed that the network of no-take marine reserves supplies nearly half of the region's coral trout fishery ...

Cycle of Coral Bleaching on the Great Barrier Reef Now at 'Catastrophic' Levels

Jan. 21, 2025 Marine scientists highlights the complex interplay between heat stress, disease onset and coral mortality. They found that 66 percent of the colonies were bleached by February 2024 and 80 per cent by ...

Great Barrier Reef Fish Evidence Suggests Shifts in Major Global Biodiversity Patterns

Jan. 14, 2025 Life on the Great Barrier Reef is undergoing big changes in the face of climate change and other human-caused pressures, a new study reveals. From food security to controlling seaweed and even making ...

Study Highlights Key Factors for Successful Restoration of Elkhorn Coral Colonies

Jan. 10, 2025 To help rare elkhorn corals survive in Florida waters, coral researchers should place them in shallow ocean locations with fast currents, scientists explained in a recent ...

Coral Reef Nightlife Becomes More Predatory With Artificial Light

Dec. 26, 2024 Artificial light can wake sleeping fish and attract predators, changing nighttime coral reef communities, according to new research using novel underwater infrared ...