Extended summary 2

Gulf corals beat the heat

Geologists have been asking themselves how the corals in the Gulf managed to stay alive and live in the extremely high temperature of the Gulf waters. Speculations and assumptions were introduced by some scientists but they were not acceptable. To find the key truth, Prof Burt, a researcher took some corals from Abu Dhabi Reef and examined them in the lab and there he was able to solve the riddle. He found the corals live in harmony and symbiosis with a kind of algae, or you could call it mutual benefit. The algae produce sugar which gives the coral energy and in return the coral gives shelter and nutrition to the algae. They depend on each other to continue to exist. But despite this the algae threaten the corals life. At high temperatures algae generate some chemicals that harm the corals and this has resulted in the loss of many corals.

On the other hand, corals have managed to endure and stay alive: how? Corals reproduce by fragmentation or by larval production. Larval keep floating for about a week and this period is called the pelagic larval duration. At the end of this period they attach themselves to rocks and form their own colony. Prof Burt suspected there are seeding reefs upstream in the Gulf and as a result of that calls for cross-boundary environmental protection agreements increased.