Coral Growth in Red Sea Slowed by Rising Temperatures, Study Says

Warming temperates in the Red Sea over the last decade have caused growth of a coral species to decline by 30 percent and may cause it to “cease growing altogether” by 2070, according to a new study. Researchers from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution used a form of CT scanning to measure growth of the coral, Diploastrea heliopora, over 10 years ending in 2008, a period when sea surface temperatures during the summer were about 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 F) higher than in previous decades. While the average summer water temperature in the 1980s was below 30 degrees C (86 F), by 2008 it approached 31 degrees C (87.8 F). Although the coral appeared to be healthy — it did not exhibit the normal sign of thermal stress, which is bleaching — the CT scanning revealed that the coral was under chronic stress during the decade, according to the study, published in the journal Science. The lowest rates of growth, the scientists said, were during the final year of the study. “The warming in the Red Sea and the resultant decline in the health of this coral is a clear regional impact of global warming,” said Neal E. Cantin, a co-lead investigator of the study.