WEBVTT - Can We Save the World's Coral? 0:00:02.040 --> 0:00:06.760 Welcome to brain Stuff from How Stuff Works, Hey, brain 0:00:06.800 --> 0:00:10.280 Stuff Laurin Vogelbaum. Here, coral reefs are being killed off 0:00:10.280 --> 0:00:14.320 faster than they can regenerate due to factors such as pollution, overfishing, 0:00:14.440 --> 0:00:17.919 and the rising ocean temperatures associated with global warming, but 0:00:18.040 --> 0:00:21.400 there is hope in a developing process for helping coral regrow. 0:00:22.560 --> 0:00:26.040 First the bad news. According to coral Vita, a coral 0:00:26.079 --> 0:00:29.760 farming and restoration organization based in Freeport Grant, Bahama, more 0:00:29.800 --> 0:00:31.960 than thirty percent of the world's reefs have died in 0:00:31.960 --> 0:00:35.479 the past few decades, and scientists predict sev of those 0:00:35.560 --> 0:00:40.160 left will die by Reefs provide a habitat for fish 0:00:40.200 --> 0:00:43.080 and wildlife, which promotes a diverse ecosystem and provides a 0:00:43.080 --> 0:00:46.040 source of food for people. Coral reefs also provide jobs 0:00:46.040 --> 0:00:48.919 in the fishing industry, plus the recreation and tourism industries 0:00:48.960 --> 0:00:52.040 thanks snorkeling and scuba diving, all while protecting shorelines from 0:00:52.040 --> 0:00:56.240 erosion and storm damage. The ecosystem of coral reef can 0:00:56.280 --> 0:00:59.280 also provide renewable resources for medical research and in the 0:00:59.320 --> 0:01:02.320 development of such things as painkillers and bone graft methods. 0:01:03.240 --> 0:01:06.240 The world's coral reefs are in decline, but coral farming 0:01:06.360 --> 0:01:09.679 may provide a solution. Coral farming is the practice of 0:01:09.680 --> 0:01:12.840 collecting coral pieces from the ocean, growing them in aquariums, 0:01:12.880 --> 0:01:15.880 and then returning them to the wild. Coral farms can 0:01:15.880 --> 0:01:18.840 be established and maintained at a low cost, and controlling 0:01:18.840 --> 0:01:22.440 growing conditions helps the coral grow more quickly. Some farms 0:01:22.440 --> 0:01:25.039 are actually installed in the ocean, making them less expensive 0:01:25.080 --> 0:01:27.880 to run, while land based farms allow scientists to work 0:01:27.920 --> 0:01:30.840 under optimal conditions and learn more about how to slow 0:01:31.000 --> 0:01:35.160 or prevent coral loss and decay. Florida based MOTE Marine 0:01:35.240 --> 0:01:38.160 Laboratory and Aquarium is credited with the discovery that coral 0:01:38.200 --> 0:01:40.760 grows faster and when it's cut or broken because of 0:01:40.800 --> 0:01:44.800 its natural self healing response to injury. Director doctor David 0:01:44.880 --> 0:01:47.440 Vaughan developed the quick grow technique by accident in two 0:01:47.480 --> 0:01:50.240 thousand six after breaking some coral in a tank, but 0:01:50.360 --> 0:01:52.520 he didn't start using the technique on a large scale 0:01:52.600 --> 0:01:56.760 until the process of fragmenting coral has been used since 0:01:56.800 --> 0:02:00.200 at least the nineteen sixties, but experts say MOTES project 0:02:00.320 --> 0:02:03.520 is the most promising attempt to mass produce reef building 0:02:03.560 --> 0:02:06.680 corals for transplant onto dead or dying reefs so far, 0:02:08.320 --> 0:02:10.720 depending on the species, The corals are grown on tree 0:02:10.720 --> 0:02:14.080 like structures constructed from PVC pipe or frames made from 0:02:14.120 --> 0:02:16.799 cement and plaster. They look a little bit like Charlie 0:02:16.800 --> 0:02:19.880 Brown's Christmas tree. On a bigger scale, A wet saw 0:02:19.960 --> 0:02:22.360 is used to cut the coral into one centimeter wide 0:02:22.360 --> 0:02:24.400 cubes that's a little less than half an inch, a 0:02:24.480 --> 0:02:29.000 process called microfragmenting. Some corals are micro fragmented and put 0:02:29.000 --> 0:02:32.480 through the growth process again instead of being transplanted. After 0:02:32.520 --> 0:02:37.040 being transplanted in groups, the coral eventually fuses together. The 0:02:37.080 --> 0:02:40.160 moat team experiments with different temperatures and acidity levels in 0:02:40.160 --> 0:02:43.320 their tanks to cultivate coral better suited to warmer temperatures 0:02:43.400 --> 0:02:46.799 and rising acidity in the ocean. Once the coral is 0:02:46.840 --> 0:02:49.720 ready to be transplanted, the team searches for dying coral 0:02:49.760 --> 0:02:52.440 of the same species. The new coral is left to 0:02:52.520 --> 0:02:55.440 fading color for thirty days before being transplanted, because the 0:02:55.480 --> 0:02:58.120 bright colors of new coral may inspire fish to be 0:02:58.160 --> 0:03:00.680 too aggressive with it. The new a coral is then 0:03:00.720 --> 0:03:03.480 attached to the old coral with epoxy, and the team 0:03:03.520 --> 0:03:07.079 waits for the new growth to begin. A similar project, 0:03:07.160 --> 0:03:10.600 reported in Aeen issue of Science Daily, was completed in 0:03:10.600 --> 0:03:14.120 Indonesia from fifteen as part of a study from the 0:03:14.160 --> 0:03:19.000 University of California, Davis and Mars Symbio Science. Researchers supplemented 0:03:19.040 --> 0:03:22.040 a coral reef with small hexagonal structures that supported new 0:03:22.080 --> 0:03:24.960 coral fragments to try to encourage fusing a new growth. 0:03:25.560 --> 0:03:28.600 This technique increased life coral by about six at a 0:03:28.600 --> 0:03:31.119 cost of about twenty five dollars per square meter that's 0:03:31.200 --> 0:03:35.440 roughly eleven square feet. Though coral restoration efforts have been 0:03:35.480 --> 0:03:38.440 successful so far, it's important to remember that lab grown 0:03:38.480 --> 0:03:41.200 coral is just a bandage on the real problem. This 0:03:41.240 --> 0:03:43.480 isn't a cure for the problems caused by global warming, 0:03:43.480 --> 0:03:46.600 researchers caution, but it's a method of buying time because 0:03:46.640 --> 0:03:49.040 there isn't enough time to wait for coral to replenish 0:03:49.080 --> 0:03:52.560 itself naturally. A cupcake sized piece of coral would normally 0:03:52.600 --> 0:03:55.160 take about two years to grow, but with this method, 0:03:55.400 --> 0:03:58.560 it grows in about four months. Wild coral takes twenty 0:03:58.640 --> 0:04:01.920 five to seventy five years to reach sexual maturity. The 0:04:01.960 --> 0:04:04.720 exact dator reproduction depends on the coral species, but the 0:04:04.800 --> 0:04:07.480 lab method reduces that time frame to just three years. 0:04:08.280 --> 0:04:11.720 Dr Vaughn told PBS that a coral structure the size 0:04:11.720 --> 0:04:14.160 of a car could be anywhere from five hundred to 0:04:14.200 --> 0:04:17.880 a thousand years old. According to David Gross, a coral biologist, 0:04:18.040 --> 0:04:21.120 Von's goal is to plant one million corals before he retires. 0:04:26.320 --> 0:04:28.760 Today's episode was written by Cheri's three Wit and produced 0:04:28.760 --> 0:04:31.159 by Tyler Clang for iHeart Media and How Stuff Works. 0:04:31.440 --> 0:04:33.880 To learn more about this and lots of other developing topics, 0:04:33.960 --> 0:04:47.440 visit our home planet, how stuff works dot com.