Ocean Life
Healthy coral reefs 🦀🐠🐟 contain thousands of fish and invertebrate species found nowhere else on Earth. They provide millions of dollars to local economies through tourism and fishing. Many scientists believe that drugs to treat cancer, arthritis, and other diseases may be found by examining the unique species that live only in and around reef systems.
⏳⏳⏳ When corals become stressed and begin to bleach the first sign is paling, then part bleached, and then whole bleached when more than 90% of the coral colony is affected. When corals begin to bleach and exhibit paling, the edge of the affected tissue blends from light to dark, in comparison to disease where the contrast between healthy and diseased tissue is seen as a distinct line.
There are several diseases which make coral’s lose their zooxanthellae causing them to become white. These diseases include white band, white blotch, black band, coralophilia (which is caused by a snail) and others. However, coral disease can be distinguished from bleaching by examining the affected area. In diseased coral tissue there is often a distinct line between the living/healthy coral tissue and the diseased portion, in comparison to coral bleaching, the transition between healthy and bleached is more gradual.
Graveyard of dead coral❗️ ⌛️ If coral colonies remain bleached for an extended period of time and do not regain their symbiotic zooxanthellae, they will die. Stony coral that is no longer covered in coral tissue often becomes covered in algae giving it a grey or reddish tinge. Over time other reef organisms may begin growing on the dead coral, but once the coral tissue has died it will not return.
Milky Way Scientists 