That coral reefs are in decline worldwide, particularly in the Caribbean, will come as no surprise. This decades-long decline has reached a potential tipping point as the weight of the effects of climate change have come decidedly to bear on the planet’s most diverse marine ecosystem. Whether coral reefs …

Tropical western Atlantic reefs have gradually shifted from being dominated by corals to being mainly covered by macroalgae. The mass-mortality of the sea urchin Diadema antillarum in the 80s and the slow to non-existent recovery exacerbated this shift. Chemical cues associated with these reefs are expected …

At Van Hall Larenstein University of Applied Sciences (HVHL) in Leeuwarden, the sea urchin Diadema antillarum has been cultivated to help restore the coral reefs around Saba and St. Eustatius (Caribbean Netherlands). The first young urchins bred in Leeuwarden were released on March 24th to the Rotterdam …

On October 22st, 2021, the first ever recorded Diadema sea urchins in the Caribbean were cultured on Saba. Diadema sea urchins are important grazers and can facilitate corals by reducing their competition with algae. By culturing them, researchers from University of Applied Sciences Van Hall Larenstein …

Coral reefs are of great importance for social, biological and economical purposes. However, due to global and local threats they are declining rapidly. One of the ways to sustain coral reefs is sexual coral propagation. While the sexual propagation of corals for reef rehabilitation has been successful …

The coral reef ecosystem provides important services such as tourism revenue, food, pharmaceutical products and coastal defence. Coral reefs are under a severe amount of threats such as pollution, overfishing and climate change. These threats result in a decrease of coral reefs and so a decrease in three- …

For multiple reasons, such as changing ocean temperatures, overfishing and unsustainable tourism coral reefs are declining worldwide. A negative feedback loop is created by the loss of three-dimensional structures that the coral reefs create. These three-dimensional structures provide shelters for grazing …

Coral reefs in the Caribbean have suffered massive losses of corals since the early 1980s due to a wide range of human impacts, such as explosive human populations growth, coastal pollution, global warming, overfishing, invasive species and diseases. The publication in the journal science in 2003 stated …

Coral reefs are one of the most important ecosystems in the world, in terms of both biological diversity and economy. These ecosystems are under a great amount of threats (e.g. climate change, pollution, coastal development and overfishing), which can lead to reef degradation and decrease of three-dimensional …

Corals harbor complex and diverse microbial communities that strongly impact host ftness and resistance to diseases, but these microbes themselves can be infuenced by stresses, like those caused by the presence of macroscopic symbionts. In addition to directly infuencing the host, symbionts may transmit …