{"id":40171,"date":"2015-11-05T09:16:59","date_gmt":"2015-11-05T19:16:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/?p=40171"},"modified":"2021-06-24T16:44:26","modified_gmt":"2021-06-25T02:44:26","slug":"breeding-corals-to-withstand-future-ocean-conditions-focus-of-world-class-research","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/2015\/11\/05\/breeding-corals-to-withstand-future-ocean-conditions-focus-of-world-class-research\/","title":{"rendered":"Coral reef resiliency research draws high-profile investments"},"content":{"rendered":"<span class=\"span-reading-time rt-reading-time\" style=\"display: block;\"><span class=\"rt-label rt-prefix\">Reading time: <\/span> <span class=\"rt-time\"> 2<\/span> <span class=\"rt-label rt-postfix\">minutes<\/span><\/span><p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"676\" height=\"380\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/yDIm65fn75Q\" title=\"Youtube video player\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_20388\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-20388\" style=\"width: 200px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/10\/gates.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"200\" height=\"233\" class=\"size-full wp-image-20388\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-20388\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Ruth Gates<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>University of <span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> at M&#257;noa&#8217;s Director of the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/himb\/\"><span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> Institute of Marine Biology<\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/www2.hawaii.edu\/~rgates\/Gates_Lab_Website\/Gates_Lab.html\"><strong>Ruth Gates<\/strong> and her team are racing against time and climate change to breed corals that can withstand future ocean conditions and that can be used to restore and build resilience in our reefs. Part of that work involves figuring out why healthy brown corals thrive while those growing right next door turn white or bleach, a sign of stress.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Said Gates, &ldquo;Everybody is affected by it here in <span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> because the reef is intimately linked to our health and our economy.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>Gates has multi-million dollar support for her world-class research from a number of prominent sources. In August, a company formed by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen called <a href=\"http:\/\/www.vulcan.com\/\">Vulcan<\/a> announced a $4-million dollar investment into Gates&#8217; and a collaborator&#8217;s research.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Related<\/strong>: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/2015\/08\/04\/ruth-gates-research-to-reverse-rapid-coral-reef-decline-supported-by-paul-g-allen\/\">&ldquo;Ruth Gates&#8217; research to reverse rapid coral reef decline supported by Paul G. Allen,&rdquo;<\/a> August 4, 2015<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&ldquo;She&#8217;s been working in the field for 25 years, amassing this knowledge of coral so that now, in this moment in time, we can really make a difference and accelerate the resiliency of corals, it&#8217;s a phenomenal opportunity,&rdquo; said Janet Greenlee director of philanthropic communications of Vulcan Inc.<\/p>\n<p>Other support came earlier in the form of a powerful confocal microscope, funded by a million-dollar 2009 donation from philanthropist Pam Omidyar. This powerful tool provides new insights into corals and the marine microorganisms that interact with them. Healthy corals display vibrant, vivid colors. Stressed corals literally pale by comparison.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Related<\/strong>: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/2013\/07\/23\/artful-images-of-coral-featured-in-pbs-digital-series\/\">&ldquo;Artful images of coral featured in PBS Digital series,&rdquo;<\/a> July 23, 2013<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2>Shared responsibility for the environment<\/h2>\n<p>Gates&#8217; team is working to build a bank of coral stocks that are preconditioned to withstand the warmer and more acidic ocean conditions of the future. She emphasizes that everyone shares responsibility for the environment.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;The thing that we need to really stress is that if you see bleached corals, don&#8217;t step on them,&rdquo; said Gates. &ldquo;If you see someone allowing runoff to come into the waters and there is muddy water going over the reef, ask them to stop doing it or report it if its a developer. Do everything you can to keep the environment around the reefs as clean as possible and as untouched as possible.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>As Gates sees it, the earth&#8217;s future depends on it.<\/p>\n<h2>More on Ruth Gates<\/h2>\n<p>After the worst coral bleaching event ever recorded in <span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span>, the <span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> Institute of Marine Biology at the University of <span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> at M&#257;noa is diligently monitoring and testing affected coral reefs in Kaneohe Bay. <a href=\"http:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/2014\/11\/12\/uh-on-the-forefront-of-coral-bleaching-research\/\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/player.vimeo.com\/video\/131610297\" width=\"620\" height=\"349\" title=\"Vimeo video player\" webkitallowfullscreen mozallowfullscreen allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Three key University of <span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> staff contributed to Hawaiian voyaging canoe <span aria-label=\"Hokulea\">H&#333;k&#363;le&#699;a<\/span> exploration and research at Australia&#8217;s Great Barrier Reef in June. <a href=\"http:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/2015\/06\/23\/hokulea-crew-and-uh-researchers-explore-great-barrier-reef\/\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n<p><em>&#8212;By Kelli Trifonovitch<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p><abbr title=\"University of Hawaii\">UH<\/abbr> M&#257;noa coral expert Ruth Gates and her team race against time to breed corals that can withstand future ocean conditions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30,12],"tags":[93,109,53,92,9,56],"class_list":["post-40171","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-research","category-video","tag-climate-change","tag-coral-reefs","tag-hawaii-institute-of-marine-biology","tag-school-of-ocean-and-earth-science-and-technology","tag-uh-manoa","tag-video-2","entry","has-media"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40171","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40171"}],"version-history":[{"count":23,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40171\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":144223,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40171\/revisions\/144223"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40171"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40171"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40171"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}