Symbiosis is such a beautiful thing. Unclouded by human characteristics such as selfishness or jealousy, cooperation in nature is simply tit for tat and nothing else. Before this semester, I had learned about a few symbiotic relationships in some of my Biology classes, but I didn’t know corals are one of the many organisms that rely on symbiosis for survival.

Building up calcium carbonate is a lot of work, and so corals work with algae called zooxanthellae (pronounced zoh-uh-zan-THEH-lee) which create useable sources of energy through photosynthesis. The corals in return provide carbon dioxide needed for photosynthetic processes. Zooxanthellae live within coral polyps, and so corals also provide them with shelter and protection. For these reasons, corals and zooxanthellae have a very harmonious relationship with each other.

An interesting fact I discovered is that zooxanthellae create a coral’s color. Photopigments used in photosynthesis can be seen within the coral, giving the coral its hue. Since different zooxanthellae produce certain photopigments, the color of a coral depends on which type of zooxanthellae is contained within the coral. I also learned that the term "coral bleaching" refers to when a coral loses its zooxanthellae due to stressors such as high water acidity or disease. I had heard of coral bleaching before, but all I knew is that it had to do with corals losing their color. Now that I know about the presence of zooxanthellae, I finally understand how and why coral bleaching occurs.

          I’m not going to lie: before I began my Coral Reef Ecology program, I knew virtually nothing about corals. When I was really little and dreamt about being a crazy awesome marine biologist, I always imagined that I would study fish or marine mammals. I never gave that much thought about corals except that I imagined they were probably very much like these guys:

Corsola Pokemon

          During last week's lecture, we were given an introduction to corals, and I learned that real corals have two important differences from their animated counterparts:

1. The term “coral” actually refers to the colonies of polyps on the surface of a hard skeleton made out of calcium carbonate. Generations of these tiny little marine animals work to build the structures that most people associate with corals, but only the outermost layer contains living coral. Corsola, on the other hand, seem to have no distinction between the two. Both the outside layer and white skeleton underneath make up one whole, cute little Pokemon.
2. Corals are far less resilient than Corsola. Both Corsola and corals are both sensitive to water pollution, but only Corsola have healing abilities that allow them to rapidly regenerate if damaged. According to our professor, simply touching or roughly brushing up against a coral can kill the polyps on the surface you come in contact with. And if a branch of the skeleton is broken off, it could take years for another branch to grow back to that same length.

          I found our intro to corals lecture to be very interesting, and I learned many details about them that I never knew before. Although I was initially more interested in experiencing the fish diversity at the Great Barrier Reef, I find that I am getting more and more excited about seeing Corsola look-alikes (such as the branching coral shown below) and other corals as we continue learning about them in class.

Acropora sp. "Branching Coral"

Now to brush up on swimming...

          Hello world! It’s been quite a while since I’ve written down/typed up any of my musings or thoughts, so I may be a little rusty at it. The last time I had anything close to a blog was a Xanga, which should give you a pretty good indicator of how long it’s been. Most of the writing I’ve done in the past four years has been research papers of some sort, and so it feels very odd to be rambling about myself rather than about p-values and experimental designs.
          At any rate, here’s the deal: I am going to Australia in May! I am finally going to be able to visit another country outside of the U.S. besides Canada! (And frankly, I hardly count going to Toronto for my mother’s college reunion as visiting another country.) I will be going there as part of a study abroad program which focuses on coral reefs, their ecosystems, and their conservation. The class I am taking before my departure requires me to use a blog to reflect on the topics and readings covered in class, so the first several posts will be dedicated to my thoughts on the knowledge I accrue in the next six weeks or so. However, I thought it would be a shame to waste such a perfectly good blog by just stopping there, and so I have decided that I will continue posting about my travels when I finally do leave for Australia. So please keep reading, and expect more soon!