Coral Bleaching Disturbs Structure Of Fish Communities
Sunday, November 2, 2008 - 23:35
in Earth & Climate
There is no longer any shadow of a doubt about the impact of global warming on coral reefs. A rise of a few degrees in sea surface temperature induces the expulsion of essential microscopic algae which live in symbiosis with the coral. This process is the cause of coral bleaching and is well known to scientists, but few large-scale studies have dealt with its effects on the structure of communities of hundreds of species of reef-colonizing fish.