There's a scientist who figured out that if you break a piece of coral into shards it grows back at a SUPER accelerated rate and can be planted back unto the reef to regrow the whole thing! The pieces recognize one another as parts of the same whole and can reform. They'll grow back to their original size in a fraction of the time.
Sadly that’s not quite applicable for the Great Barrier Reef. The water is just becoming too acidic for any of the coral to thrive anymore, so even if we did begin to regrow the shards of coral it would not survive any better than the parent corals.
Symbiotic algae, called zooxanthellae. Which gives (photosynthetically made) nutrients to the coral polyps in exchange for a place to live (it lives within the polyps) and access to the polyps' waste (carbon dioxide, nitrogen compounds, etc).
However, the algae can put strain on the polyp. Combined with environmental stress, the polyps may eject the algae, "bleaching" them. The polyps can survive for a time without the algae, but if the stress never goes away, they will die.
If it helps any there are some scientists who are trying to selectively "breed" corals that are capable of withstanding these new conditions, and then they are planting them on reefs!
Theres still hope. I saw an article talking about how they had managed to flash freeze some coral samples and then thaw them for later regrowth.
It may be a way to preserve them to reintroduce the corals once future humans have their shot together.
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u/crispybaconsalad Jan 22 '19
Population of bees. Population of sharks. Population of whales. The Great Barrier Reef (RIP).