As the world's hottest sea, as well as one of the saltiest, the Gulf poses an interesting question for scientists studying how coral reefs will adapt to climate change.
And now, thanks to an ongoing collaboration between New York University Abu Dhabi and the University of Southampton, scientists have discovered that the Gulf's coral is able to thrive in such hot temperatures thanks to the high salinity of the sea.
Published in "The ISME Journal," these findings have not-so fun implications for global warming, as it means that this kind of coral cannot be transplanted into other seas.
Worldwide, coral thrives at 28 degrees . If it is exposed to much higher temperatures, it begins to "bleach" or expel algae from its tissues. In Australia, coral bleaches if water reaches 31 degrees while in the Gulf, bleaching begins at 35 to 36 degrees. This is the highest-known bleaching threshold in the world.
Scientists began studying this in 2012 and found that the Gulf coral, if exposed to lower salinity levels, lose their high tolerance for heat. This finding has important implications for global warming.
As the world's oceans heat up, many coral reefs will die as their bleaching points are reached. If the Gulf's coral was resistant to heat for another reason (scientists thought it could have been due to a symbiotic relationship with a specific kind of algae) than perhaps that resistance could be replicated or the Gulf's coral could be bred and planted into other bodies of water, like the nearby Indian ocean.
However, since the coral's resistant to heat is due to the high salinity in the water, this means that coral reef's survival worldwide cannot necessarily be influenced. The Gulf is a uniquely salty sea thanks to its shallow depths and isolation from larger bodies of water.
Steps to protect coral in the future include eduction of nutrient enrichment, sedimentation, overfishing, destructive coastal development and the reduction of carbon dioxide emissions, as well as protection of the Gulf waters as scientists will continue to study the unique makeup of their reefs.