Warming ocean water has devastating effects on coral reefs, causing coral to bleach by expelling their symbiotic algae.
Image: Hughes et al. Current Biology
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Global warming is expected to have devastating effects on coral reefs, but recent research points to a few exceptions.
Warming in the equatorial Pacific may actually create refuges for corals around a handful of islands, even as it bleaches, or kills, corals elsewhere, suggests new research that predicts increased upwelling of cold, nutrient-rich water in these places.
"These little islands in the middle of the ocean can counteract global trends and have a big impact on their own future, which I think is a beautiful concept," said study researcher Kristopher Karnauskas, a Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution scientist, in a press release issued by the institution.
If predictions made by Karnauskas and colleague Anne Cohen are accurate, warming around the Gilbert Islands will be slower than elsewhere, giving the corals and their symbiotic algae a better chance to adapt. Perhaps these refuges could eventually become a source of new corals and other species that could recolonize reefs damaged by warming, Karnauskas said.
Corals are animals that host tiny plants, or algae, that feed them using photosynthesis. The reefs corals build provide important habitat for many species. Warming water can cause corals to expel their algae, a phenomenon called bleaching, which turns the corals white and puts them under great stress and at risk of death.
Global climate models predict the central tropical Pacific will warm by about 5.0 degrees Fahrenheit (2.8 degrees Celsius) by the end of the century. To get a better idea of how conditions might play out on a small geographic scale, the researchers used the global models in combination with a fine-scale regional model.
The low-lying coral atoll islands, part of the nation of Kiribati, are as small as 1.54 square miles (4 square kilometers).
As a result of other changes caused by warming, their work predicts the deep equatorial undercurrent (EUC), an eastward flowing current at the equator, will strengthen by 14 percent; this strengthening would create habitat for corals to flourish alongside the islands by bringing cooler water and nutrients to the surface. Though the EUC is an east-to-west current, when it hits an island, water gets deflected upward.
"Our model suggests that the amount of upwelling will actually increase by about 50 percent around these islands and reduce the rate of warming waters around them by about 1.25 degrees F (0.7 degrees C) per century," Karnauskas said.
The research appears in the April 30 issue of the journal Nature Climate Change.
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17 Comments
Add CommentWhere exactly is this mythical place where Global Warming is devastating coral reefs?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYawn!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1 another day, more purple Kool-aid.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTomorrow...increase in baseball homeruns due to global warming....oops, that was already on SCIAM yesterday.
Wow. You guys are quick on the trigger. So, poker, geo, and Carlyle, what is it that you guys study (50 or more hours of the week) that gives you credibility on the subject? All of you are graduates of Clown College. I need not provide links to websites that refute your views (as I already have). Your myopic, ignorant, and sophomoric attitudes speak volumes.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTo those who are recent graduates of Clown College, cited above, the article refers to atoll islands that have an area of 1.54 sq. mi. . . . There are many outliers in science, and this is one of them. Deniers of AGW are fans of the outlier; that's all they have.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIlluminate us with your superior knowledge on the subject. Particularly relating to my question. It would also help if you could tell us how many months you have spent diving on say The Great Barrier Reef, both for pleasure & as a salvage diver recovering war debris around Pacific Islands. How many papers you have read on the subject from marine biologists connected to a recognised university highly regarded in the field. Then come back & enlighten us.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWHOA!!! STOP THE Presses!!! Corals can move to colonize new areas???
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisCorals are rocks. How can that happen??? How can rocks move???
Oh yeah they are planktic in the larval stage and can travel anywhere in the oceans currents and establish colonies ie., reefs..
Never mind.
I thought the definition of an outlier was any weather station located in a rural district totally unaffected by the urban heat island effect. That's why their temperatures are ignored or modified upwards to bring them into line with urban stations. Pretty basic stuff really.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this:)
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFacts? We don't need your stinking facts! Why right-wing Americans are so stubbornly ignorant.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://idealistpropaganda.blogspot.com/2011/02/facts-we-dont-need-your-stinking-facts.html
>> Where exactly is this mythical place where Global Warming is devastating coral reefs?<<
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAccording to National Geographic, the mythical place would be the Seychelles.
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/05/warming-coral.html
Ironically, their title is precisely “Global Warming Has Devastating Effect on Coral Reefs, Study Shows”
oh, and
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://www.livescience.com/4433-coral-reef-devastation-linked-global-warming.html
Not as good sources as I usually cite (NASA, NOAA, Navy) but still credible. The Royal Society (on your supernovas) is fine, by the way.
Mark my observation over all the years that the AGW debate has been running is that alarmist reports hit the news whenever something like coral bleaching occurs but when nature recovers from the blow it is not news worthy. The fact that I can not find any recent news on the condition of coral in the Seychelles makes me very suspicious that recovery is taking place. This is the same cycle as occurs on land where flood fire or hurricane damage takes place. In time they recover & the forces are natural. The same scare gets publicity whenever there is a natural event on Australia’s Great Barrier Reef. It is in great shape despite suffering a variety of events such as bleaching & star of thorns attacks. There have been scientific papers reporting the remarkable recovery & resilience of the reef but try finding them. I will leave it to you to look. If you can not find any reports that verify what I say, get back to me & I will give you a link. Even if you do, you will find that for every positive report there will be dozens of alarmist reports. You & millions of others are being cheated of the opportunity to get balance in the coverage of these events. You have to dig. There are things of concern that need to be stopped. Reefs are subject to poisoning & dynamiting as easy methods of stunning fish, causing them to float to the surface. There is a lucrative trade in aquarium fish obtained this way. Of course the mortality rate is high & repeated attack results in severe reef damage but because these practices are carried out mostly by indigenous people the subject is virtually taboo in the environment movement.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI found this on a blog site local to the area. It goes on to warn of danger to the eef but does confirm what I suspected. Many places like this attract researchers on attractive research grants though piraes in the area has made them thinner recently I have been told.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRecovering coral in the Seychelles. Photo by Rainer von Brandis.
After the 1998 El Nino event the damaged coral in the Seychelles had severe knock-on effects for all marine life. What was once an area of pristine coral reefs transformed into expanses of barren rock and algae, much to the detriment of all organisms up the food chain. However, now more than a decade has passed and the marine life in the Seychelles seems to have been back on track for recovery; some stunning diving can be had similar tothat of the time before El Nino and many fish stocks have returned to healthy levels.
http://lavwa-seychelles.blogspot.com.au/2010/05/coral-reefs-in-seychelles-face-new.html
That is interesting though the blogger seems to believe only conservatives suffer from the condition. Neatly pigeonholing him as one of the typical examples of the condition described, but he is obviously of the left. The condition in fact is common to both camps. It is worth a read if you can overlook the childish profanity.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf the shoe fits Carlyle...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSo what group is exempt in your opinion? Yourself for instance? Those who share your views? Pardon me if I laugh.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this:)
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