RSRC Newsletter, Issue 10, Winter-Spring 2021

Photo © Morgan Bennett-Smith

Issue 10 Winter-Spring

2021

RED SEA RESEARCH CENTER

NEWSLETTER

Photo © Morgan Bennett-Smith

Photo © Morgan Bennett-Smith

CONTENTS DIRECTOR’S MESSAGE

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RESEARCH HIGHLIGHTS

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kelp help: seeking options for blue carbon

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microbiome boost may help corals resist bleaching

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deep and extreme: microbes thrive in transition

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lockdowns unlock ecology research potential

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corals go hungry long before they bleach

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coral symbionts have a genome like no other

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RECENT NEWS

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rsrc book: ‘into the red sea’

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a milestone in saudi scientific diving

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will probiotics save corals or harm them?

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student focus: silvia vimercati

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working towards a safer future for our oceans

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kaust research conference: ocean carbon and biogeochemistry in tropical seas

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RSRC GRADUATES

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RSRC NEW PEOPLE

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DIRECTOR’S MESSAGE Professor

Michael Berumen Dear all, Welcome to the latest edition of the Red Sea Research Center Newsletter. While the global pandemic continues to create complications for many aspects of research, the past semester saw increasing reductions in restrictions for our operations (and for community life in general). I would again like to extend my sincere thanks to everyone for their cooperation and compliance with the relevant guidelines.The high level of compliance and growing number of fully vaccinated community members is a major part of why our Health, Safety, and Environment team have begun to relax conditions for our work.

As travel gradually opens up for many parts of the world, I know many of you are planning long overdue vacations and holidays.

Whether you are undertaking a domestic trip, venturing off internationally, or enjoying a ‘staycation’ at KAUST, I wish you all a safe and refreshing break. Stay healthy!

We are also happy to report that two new faculty members have accepted offers to join us in the RSRC. Dr. Maggie Johnson and Dr. Mike Fox are hoping to arrive at KAUST towards the end of 2021. They are both currently postdocs at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in the USA. Maggie brings to KAUST her expertise in phycology and particular interest in calcifying algae. Mike has developed exciting applications of isotope ecology coupled with oceanographic approaches to better understand marine ecology and nutrient cycles. Both Maggie and Mike have extensive previous work in coral reef systems and we look forward to seeing how they develop lines of work here in the Red Sea. 6

Photo © Morgan Bennett-Smith

This past semester, we also welcomed several new staff and students, who you can “meet” on page 37. This includes a new Center technician, Carolina Bocanegra.We are fortunate to have Fran Bernat take on a new role as the RSRC Lab Manager.

I want to acknowledge his constant support and leadership during the previous challenging year as we navigated the COVID situation and its impact on our research facilities. Moving forward, Fran is always ready to assist with any questions that you may have about our Center lab operations.

As always, the newsletter features many highlights from recent advances and publications from our Center’s diverse team of researchers. If you have any news items or features that you think could be included in a future issue of the newsletter, please reach out to Seda Gasparyan to discuss your idea.

Enjoy the rest of the summer and we will look forward to seeing you all for a new semester soon!

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KELP HELP: SEEKING OPTIONS FOR BLUE CARBON Tackling climate change in marine ecosystems requires diverse strategies, from protecting coasts to farming kelp and restoring whale populations.

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Conserving the world’s oceans and coastal ecosystems is a no-regrets strategy posing huge benefits for people and planet,” explains Carlos Duarte, KAUST’s leading marine ecologist. For three decades, Duarte has led research into “blue carbon” ecosystems that can help both mitigation and adaptation to climate change and that include coasts, sandy beaches, mangroves, kelp forests, salt marshes and seagrasses.

These ecosystems generate multiple benefits, both as carbon sinks and the other ecosystem services they provide such as habitats for fisheries and many marine species; regulators of coastal water quality; protectors from storms, floods and sea-level rise; and sources of food and employment opportunities from transport to tourism.

Marine ecosystems can reduce climate change through sequestering carbon from the atmosphere and oceans to then store it in the same marine ecosystems as blue carbon. Newly identified options for sequestering blue carbon show great promise — for example, previous research by Duarte and colleagues shows that types of macroalgae can store more carbon that other coastal plants.

Now, Duarte and colleagues have estimated the potentials of Australia and China to store organic carbon in vegetated coastal systems, mangroves, salt marshes and seagrasses. They have also assessed the distribution of brown seaweeds and macroalgae and their potential contribution to carbon storage.

Duarte’s recent research also includes a strategy to rebuild marine life by 2050 that shows, for example, that restoring great whale stocks could sequester as much as 0.8 gigatons of carbon each year. “Whales do more than store carbon in themselves,” Duarte explains. “They move nutrients, accelerating productivity in the oceans and keeping them fertile. So as we rebuild the stocks of whales and other animals, the oceans will become more productive and capable of sequestering carbon. Improving the biosphere improves its capacity to achieve balance once more.”

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Blue carbon ecosystems, such as mangroves, saltmarshes, kelp forests and seagrass meadows, act as carbon sinks by removing carbon from the atmosphere and storing it below ground in their sediments. © 2021 KAUST; Xavier Pita

Despite their importance, blue carbon ecosystems are under threat from climate change, fishing, pollution, marine pests and coastal urban development. For example, around half of the world’s mangrove ecosystems have already been lost. “If these communities of mangroves, seagrasses and saltmarshes are to provide vital ecosystem services, then we need to protect them and to take any opportunity to restore these habitats,” says Duarte.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Prof. Carlos Duarte KAUST Distinguished Professor Prof. Carlos Duarte is a world leader in multiple branches of biological oceanography and marine ecology.

His research is characterized by versatility addressing marine ecosystems from the tropics to polar ecosystems, from macrophytes to microbes, and from coastal systems to open ocean gyres using a broad range of approaches.

Read this story and more on KAUST Discovery here.

Related publications Duarte, C.M., Agusti, S., Barbier, E., Britten, G.L., Castilla, J.C., Gattuso, J.P., Fulweiler, R.W., Hughes, T.P., Knowlton, N., Lovelock, C.E., Lotze, H.K., Predragovic, M., Poloczanska, E., Roberts, C. & Worm, B. Rebuilding marine life Nature 580, 39–51 (2020)

Ortega, A., Geraldi, N.R., Inktihab, A., Kamau, A.A., Acinas, S.G., Logares, R., Gasol, J.M., Massana, R., Krause-Jensen, D. & Duarte, C.M. Important contribution of macroalgae to oceanic carbon sequestration Nature Geoscience 12, 748–754 (2019)

Gouvêa, L.P., Assis, J., Gurgel, C.F., Serrão, E.A., Silveira, T.C., Santos, R., Duarte, C.M., Peres, L.M., Carvalho,V.F., Batista, M. & Bastos, E. Golden carbon of Sargassum forests revealed as an opportunity for climate change mitigation Science of the Total Environment 729, 138745 (2020)

Wu, J., Zhang, H., Pan,Y., Krause-Jensen, D., He, Z., Fan, W., Xiao, X., Chung, I., Marbà, N., Serrano, O. and Rivkin, R.B., Zheng,Y., Gu, J., Zhang, X., Zhang, Z., Zhao, P., Qui, W., Chen, G. & Duarte, C.M. Opportunities for blue carbon strategies in China Ocean & Coastal Management 194, 105241 (2020) 9

MICROBIOME BOOST MAY HELP CORALS RESIST BLEACHING Providing corals with cocktails of natural probiotics could enhance their tolerance to stress and reduce mortality in coral bleaching events.

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simple but powerful idea is to improve the health of corals using cocktails of beneficial bacteria. The strategy is being explored as part of global scientific efforts to help corals become stronger, more stress resistant and more likely to survive bleaching events associated with climate change.

Corals rely on bacterial and algal symbionts to provide nutrients, energy (through photosynthesis), toxin regulation and protection against pathogenic attacks. This complex and finely balanced relationship underpins the health of the holobiont and coral reefs as a whole.

Rather like the use of probiotics in plant science to improve growth and resilience, Professor Raquel Peixoto believes that, in times of stress, corals could benefit from a boost to their natural symbiotic partners.

“This is not the solution to the destruction of our coral reefs; the best solution lies in worldwide CO₂ mitigation,” says Peixoto, who joined KAUST in 2020 from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.“But we’re hopeful that we can buy corals some time by using beneficial microorganisms for corals (or BMCs) and providing a ‘medicine’ to help them better cope with shifting environmental pressures and adapt to a changing world.”

Peixoto has previously conducted lab-based experiments trialing BMCs in collaboration with KAUST researchers and is continuing her groundbreaking research now she is based on campus.

“It is exciting to work right beside the Red Sea, which is arguably the best source of powerful coral probiotics on Earth,” says Peixoto.

“These reefs have adapted to higher temperatures and salinity than other regions, providing an ideal model for stress-tolerant corals and bacteria.”

To ensure BMCs are safe, Peixoto and her team select bacteria that are naturally symbiotic to specific coral species on each reef, ensuring no alien bacteria are accidentally introduced. Peixoto is encouraged by their lab-based results so far, including one study that involved inoculating a single coral species with a BMC consortium comprising six bacteria strains. The coral’s microbiome underwent dynamic genetic and metabolic alterations that boosted its chances of survival under heat stress.

“As well as further proof of concept of BMCs, this provides us with a fantastic model of host-microbiome interactions, demonstrating just how intimate the relationships are,” says Peixoto.

Success in the lab, however, needs to translate to success in the open oceans, which requires innovative multidisciplinary research.

Scaling up and seeding whole reefs might involve robots and artificial intelligence (AI), for example, which could deliver probiotics either into sediments or directly to corals. Slow-release “pills” could disseminate the probiotic consortia in the right place at the right time. “Bleaching events can be predicted,” notes Peixoto, “so specific regions could be targeted for a month or two ahead of time to boost coral health.”

The KAUST team is also considering the feasibility to create “universal” BMC consortia that would be effective for whole reefs.

They are currently working with five common coral species from an offshore reef near KAUST. They will test the corals with a specific BMC consortium for each species but will also test their response to a universal consortium.

“Ultimately, we may need to develop several consortia targeting the majority of species in a reef,” says Peixoto.“If we have to pick, we’ll choose those corals that most need our help.”

Read this story and more on KAUST Discovery here.

Related publication Peixoto, R.S., Sweet, M.,Villela, H.D.M., Cardoso, P., Thomas, T., Voolstra, C.R., Høj, L. & Bourne, D.G. Coral probiotics: Premise, promise, prospects Annual Review of Animal Biosciences 9, 19.1-19.24 (2021)

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Cutting-edge research at KAUST is exploring the use of probiotic symbiotic bacteria to improve the growth and resilience of corals in the face of climate change. © 2021 Morgan Bennett-Smith

The supply of beneficial bacteria is hoped to help corals adapt to higher temperatures and salinity and ultimately help reefs recover from bleaching, such as that pictured above. © 2021 Morgan Bennett-Smith

Photo © Khulud Muath

Professor Raquel Peixoto Associate Professor of Marine Science In KAUST’s Red Sea Research Center, Professor Peixoto’s research addresses the diversity, ecological role and biotechnological potential of marine organisms of the Red Sea. She also investigates how these microbiomes can be used as models and sources to explore the key symbiotic mechanisms promoting the coral host’s resistance and resilience.

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DEEP AND EXTREME: MICROBES THRIVE IN TRANSITION A lot happens and changes within a thin one-meter-thick transition layer between deep Red Sea water and an expansive underlying brine lake.

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diverse microbial community has adapted to an extremely salty environment deep in the Red Sea.The microbes, many unknown to science, occupy a one-meter-thick area overlying the Suakin Deep, an expansive 80-meter-deep brine lake, 2,771 meters below the central Red Sea. The chemical properties of this thin “brine-seawater interface,” along with the composition of microbial communities, change surprisingly rapidly across a sharp gradient.

“Our study sheds light on how microorganisms in the Suakin Deep’s brine-seawater interface make an oasis of life in the desert of the deep Red Sea,” says Professor Daniele Daffonchio, who led the study. Daffonchio and his colleagues at KAUST, with collaborators in Germany and Spain, found that microbial cell densities are more than double in this interface than in normal deep Red Sea water and the brine below.

The Suakin Deep is one of around 25 deep brine lakes in the Red Sea. Few studies have analyzed the thin brine-seawater interface above it, and none have taken into account how its properties change from top to bottom.

Daffonchio’s team used a sampler called a Niskin Rosette to analyze water every nine centimeters within this interface. This cylindrical apparatus holds 23 identical 90-centimeter-long 10-liter bottles, along with a detector that measures salinity, temperature and depth.

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The sampler was deployed by KAUST’s research vessel with the bottles open until the detector signaled that the apparatus had reached the Suakin Deep’s brine-seawater interface. The bottles were then filled with interface water and remotely shut, and the apparatus then returned to the ship.This way, the water column in the bottles represented most of the water column in the interface.

One-liter fractions of water, each corresponding to a different depth in the actual interface, were analyzed for their chemical and microbial contents.

The team found many types of microbial communities, which changed with variations in oxygen and salinity within the water column.

“Many of the microbes were new, with their closest relatives coming from hydrothermal vents at the bottom of the sea and from subsurface sediments,” says environmental microbiologist Grégoire Michoud, the study’s first author.

The team sequenced the genome of a microbe they called Candidatus Scalindua arabica, which was concentrated within a 20-centimeter-layer in the middle of the brine-seawater interface. The metabolic processes conducted by this and other microbes suggest this transition zone is a critical niche for nitrogen cycling.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Dr. Grégoire Michoud A rich community of previously undescribed microbes exists in the transition layer between the deep water of the Red Sea and the surface of brine pools, such as that pictured above discovered during the Five Deeps Expedition.© Caladan Oceanic LLC

Oceanic brine pools could be similar to extraterrestrial environments like the saline ocean that is expected to exist under the surface of Jupiter’s satellite Europa. “Knowledge of the microbial networks in extreme Earth environments could help us hypothesize how lifeforms on extraterrestrial bodies thrive and function,” explains Daffonchio. “These microbes could also harbor enzymes and other properties that could be useful in medical and biotechnology applications.”

Former RSRC Postdoctoral Fellow While a member of Professor Daniele Daffonchio’s group in KAUST’s Red Sea Research Center, Grégoire’s research focused on the characterization of the coping mechanisms of prokaryotes in extreme environments, such as deep sea brine pools.

The team plans to continue analyzing other Red Sea brine pools and their brine-seawater interfaces to examine how different conditions affect microbial content.

Read this story and more on KAUST Discovery here.

Related publication Michoud, G., Ngugi, D.K., Barozzi, A., Merlino, G., Calleja, M.Ll., Delgado-Huertas, A., Moran, X.A.G. & Daffonchio, D. Fine-scale metabolic discontinuity in a stratified prokaryote The ISME Journal (2021)

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LOCKDOWNS UNLOCK ECOLOGY RESEARCH POTENTIAL National lockdowns have provided a unique opportunity to assess the effects of human activity on wildlife, which could translate into new attitudes and better policies.

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hen most of the world went into lockdown to limit the spread of COVID-19, ecologists realized that these tragic circumstances presented a unique opportunity to study how the presence, or absence, of humans affects biodiversity.

The freedom to travel and transport goods by land, air or sea has underpinned social and economic progress yet has been costly to the natural world, destroying habitats and contributing to climate change. In April 2020, an estimated 4.4 billion people experienced a full or partial national lockdown, compelled to severely limit their movements. And the natural world expanded its reach.

As people remained in their homes, wildlife showed up in unexpected places, with many sightings shared on social media. When Carlos Duarte, Distinguished Professor in KAUST, noticed the rising reports of unusual animal behavior, he launched the PAN-Environment project to connect international researchers studying the ecological impacts of lockdowns.

“Our aim is to use this serendipitous global human confinement experiment to assess the effects of human activity on biodiversity and ecosystems at a global scale,” says Duarte, who leads the project alongside Amanda Bates, a marine ecologist at the Memorial University of Newfoundland, and Richard Primack, an ecologist at Boston University.

Lockdowns worldwide have provided an unprecedented opportunity to observe how human activities affect wildlife. Photo © Morgan Bennett-Smith

Abundant anecdotal evidence during the lockdowns — jackals prowling parks in Tel Aviv, monkeys ruling empty roads in India, a beaver window-shopping in Berlin — suggests that animals took advantage of the absence of humans. But warning signs also showed some species could be at risk as more people descended upon green spaces or began hunting and foraging for their own food. Duarte’s team recognized the need for a quantitative scientific investigation.

Most endeavors to measure humanity’s impact on animals have focused either on changes over space — how biodiversity differs between protected and unprotected areas, for example — or over time — how wildlife in one area responds to short- or long-term changes in human activity.The COVID-19 pandemic created similar perturbations around the world as many countries imposed similar strict protective measures.

Anecdotal evidence suggests that wildlife took advantage of the absence of humans.

Photo © Morgan Bennett-Smith 14

ABOUT THE AUTHOR PAN-Environment is gathering global data from diverse sources so ecologists can compare animal behavior before, during and after lockdown, as well as between sites with different levels of restrictions, and compare with results from remote or inaccessible “control” sites.This should reveal if reduced human activity really did enable animals to expand their ranges and increase their numbers, and if the lack of conservation efforts left more endangered species exposed.

It is also an opportunity to assess the strengths and weaknesses of existing observation systems and use the findings to improve biodiversity conservation.

Organizing a global research effort amidst lockdown restrictions presents many challenges. “Coordinating large teams around the world is tricky when you cannot meet,” says Duarte,“Fortunately, KAUST sits in a convenient time zone between east and west, enabling me to do so.”

However, with most researchers in confinement, the team could not keep up observations, making it difficult to get robust data sets.

“This is where big data approaches can help reduce uncertainties,” he adds.

Duarte’s team called upon environmental and citizen scientists, such as the Bio-Logging Initiative, fellow biologists and ecologists, and owners of human mobility data to provide open and rapid access to their observations. By combining diverse data sources, including traditional wildlife surveys and anecdotes, animal tracking devices, remote sensing, social media and geolocated photographs, they hope to gather sufficient real-time data to inform immediate conservation actions.

Professor Carlos Duarte KAUST Distinguished Professor of Marine Science Professor Carlos Duarte is a prominent leader in many branches of biological oceanography and marine ecology.

Throughout his multifaceted research career, Duarte has participated in research expeditions all over the world, from the tropics to both poles, studying ecological systems, biogeochemical cycles, coastal systems, macrophytes, microbes, seagrasses and open ocean gyres.

The team used traditional wildlife surveys and anecdotal evidence, animal tracking devices, remote sensing, social media and geolocated photographs as sources of data for their survey. © 2021 Morgan Bennett-Smith 15

The PAN-Environment project is gathering global data from diverse sources so ecologists can compare animal behavior before, during and after lockdown. © 2021 Morgan Bennett-Smith

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Anecdotal evidence has already revealed some positives. As industrial activities ceased, air and water quality improved; for instance, daily global carbon dioxide emissions fell by 17 percent at the start of lockdown. Noise pollution also decreased, which may explain animal sightings in harbors and cities. However, the loss of ecotourism in protected areas could cut funding for wildlife protection and antipoaching programs, while canceled biodiversity conferences will delay policies destined to help nations reach the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

The lockdown has shown that monumental changes in human behavior are possible, which challenges the notion that the large-scale societal changes needed to combat global crises, such as climate change, are impossible to achieve.

Duarte’s team recommends a rapid return to conservation research and education (with pandemic-appropriate safety measures) that prioritize species recovery and habitat protection. “Humanity’s role as custodians of nature is impacted when our ability to remain active is impaired,” says Duarte. He is optimistic that their work will benefit both humans and animals.“As we move on from COVID-19, lessons from PAN-Environment will help us balance our role in the biosphere,” he says.“Limiting activities that negatively impact wildlife, while promoting those that benefit the natural world, will ultimately feed back into healthier lives.”

For now, there are vast volumes of data to process, publish and act upon. “What we learn from this experiment could transform the way humans relate to the species we share the planet with,” says Duarte. From this unforgettable crisis, people may rediscover the benefits of a healthy environment, and, as the team concludes, “replace a sense of owning with a sense of belonging.”

Read this story and more on KAUST Discovery here.

Related publications Bates, A.E., Primack, R.B., Moraga, P. & Duarte, C.M., COVID-19 pandemic and associated lockdown as a “Global Human Confinement Experiment” to investigate biodiversity conservation.

Biological Conservation 248, 108665 (2020) Rutz, C., Loretto, M-C., Bates, A.E., Davidson, S.C., Duarte, C M., ...

Comment: COVID-19 lockdown allows researchers to quantify the effects of human activity on wildlife.

Nature Ecology and Evolution 4, 1156-1159 (2020)

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CORALS GO HUNGRY LONG BEFORE THEY BLEACH Heat stress disrupts the physiological processes of corals prior to clear signs of bleaching, with implications for adaptation strategies for coral reefs in a warming climate.

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he results of coral beaching are obvious — stark underwater forests of white coral skeletons — yet the physiological processes of bleaching are not well understood. Now, KAUST researchers show that, long before signs of bleaching appear, prolonged spells of warm water cause heat stress that disrupts the nutrient cycling of the coral and its symbiotic algae.

Coral reefs occur in warm low-nutrient waters. Stony corals include the coral animal, which is a cnidarian host that lives in symbiosis with Symbiodiniaceae, single-celled algae that photosynthesize to help “feed” the coral in exchange for the protection of the coral tissue. During a bleaching event, the algae are expelled by the coral, which may lead to the coral’s starvation and death. Current thinking, explains Nils Rädecker, a former PhD student at KAUST and now at the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), “was that this starvation was the result of the corals losing the algae as their main source of energy.” However, a few signals suggested that it is not as simple as that.

To investigate, the research team transported five colonies of a cauliflower coral (Stylophora pistillata) from Abu Shosha reef in the Red Sea to KAUST’s aquarium tanks, which were set up to closely mimic reef conditions. Once acclimatized, the corals were subjected to heat stress conditions that matched local maximum summer temperatures in 2017.

The research team showed that the stable coral-algal symbiosis relies on the algae remaining nitrogen-limited as it “ensures the algae transfer photosynthetic carbon as sugars to the coral host instead of investing it in their own growth,” explains Rädecker. “However, during heat stress the corals consume their own energy reserves (amino acids) and release waste ammonium that, in turn, stimulates algal symbiont growth.”

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This sets up a new cycle. “This metabolic imbalance destabilizes the symbiotic nutrient cycling: as the algal symbionts grow, they translocate less carbon to their coral host,” says Rädecker. “Then, because the coral host receives less carbon from its algae, it releases ammonium, thereby stimulating algal growth.” The expulsion of the algae during bleaching is not the cause of coral stress, says Nils, but rather “bleaching is a symptom of a disturbed symbiosis, in which the algae no longer provide food to their coral host,” he says.

Current management strategies focus on quantifying the severity of bleaching, but these new results suggest an alternative focus.

“Regular monitoring of the nutritional status of corals could help to detect long-term trends in the response of corals to changing environmental conditions and to anticipate problems before reefs are bleaching,” explains Rädecker.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Dr. Nils Rädecker RSRC Alumnus During his PhD fellowship in KAUST’s Red Sea Research Center, Nils combined physiological and molecular tools to investigate the role of metabolic interactions in the coral holobiont during coral bleaching.

Regular monitoring of the nutritional status of corals could help to detect long-term trends in the response of corals to climate change and other environmental stressors. © 2021 Morgan Bennett-Smith

These findings also emphasize broad benefits “from identifying reefs that are vulnerable to bleaching and implementing appropriate countermeasures, rather than having to ‘rescue’ them once bleached,” says Professor Christian Voolstra, formerly of KAUST and now at the University of Konstanz in Germany. “Our study shows that controlling the water quality, such as nitrate levels, in the environment could help repress destabilizing the metabolic feedback loop when reef water temperatures go up.”

Related publication Read this story and more on KAUST Discovery here.

Rädecker, N., Pogoreutz, C., Gegner, H.M., Cárdenas, A., Roth, F., Bougoure, J., Guagliardo P., Wild C., Pernice M., Raina J.B., Meibom A. & Voolstra, C.R. Heat stress destabilizes symbiotic nutrient cycling in corals Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 118, (2021)

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CORAL SYMBIONTS HAVE A GENOME LIKE NO OTHER The weird and wonderful genome of dinoflagellates looks nothing like other eukaryotic genomes.

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he genome of single-celled plankton, known as dinoflagellates, is organized in an incredibly strange and unusual way, according to new research. The findings lay the groundwork for further investigation into these important marine organisms and dramatically expand our picture of what a eukaryotic genome can look like.

Researchers from KAUST, the U.S. and Germany have investigated the genomic organization of the coral-symbiont dinoflagellate Symbiodinium microadriaticum.The S. microadriaticum genome had already been sequenced and assembled into segments known as scaffolds but lacked a chromosome-level assembly.

The team used a technique known as Hi-C to detect interactions in the dinoflagellate’s chromatin, the combination of DNA and protein that makes up a chromosome. By analyzing these interactions, they could figure out how the scaffolds were connected together into chromosomes, giving them a view into the spatial and structural organization of the genome.

A striking finding was that the genes in the genome tended to be organized in alternating unidirectional blocks. “That’s really, really different to what you see in other organisms,” says Octavio Salazar, a postdoc in Professor Manuel Aranda’s group at KAUST and one of the lead authors of the study.The orientation of genes on a chromosome is usually random. In this case, however, genes were consistently oriented one way and then the other, with the boundaries between blocks showing up clearly in the chromatin interaction data.

This organization is also reflected in the three-dimensional structure of the genome, which the team inferred comprises rod-shaped chromosomes that fold into structural domains at the boundaries where gene blocks converge. Even more intriguingly, this structure appears to be dependent on transcriptional activity.When the researchers treated cells with a chemical that blocks gene transcription, the structural domains disappeared.

This unusual link is consistent with another strange fact about dinoflagellates — they have very few transcription factors in their genome and do not seem to respond to environmental changes by altering gene expression.They may use gene dosage to control expression and adapt to the environment by losing or gaining chromosomes or perhaps via epigenetic structural modifications.

The researchers plan to explore all of these questions.

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Another open question is the origin of this exceptional genome structure. Dinoflagellates produce very few histones, the proteins used by other eukaryotes to structure their DNA, instead using viral proteins incorporated into their genome long ago. The extraordinary genome structure and genetic regulation may be a consequence of how these viral proteins work, but that remains to be confirmed.

The dinoflagellate genome defies the expectation and dogmas built from studying other eukaryotes.“It shows that nature can work in a completely different way than we thought,” says Salazar.“There are so many possibilities for what could have happened as life evolved.”

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Dr. Octavio Salazar RSRC Postdoctoral Fellow In the Red Sea Research Center, Octavio works with Professor Manuel Aranda analyzing the genomes of corals and their dinoflagellate endosymbionts to understand their interactions that prevent coral bleaching.

The international research team discovered that the genome of dinoflagellates is organized in a unique way compared to other eukaryotic genomes. © KAUST

Read this story and more on KAUST Discovery here.

Related publication A. Nand,Y. Zhan, O.R. Salazar, M. Aranda, C.R.Voolstra, J. Dekker Genetic and spatial organization of the unusual chromosomes of the dinoflagellate Symbiodinium microadriaticum Nature Genetics volume 53, pages618–629 (2021)

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RECENT NEWS

Professor Carlos Duarte’s paper entitled “The soundscape of the Anthropocene ocean” was included in the 5 most popular scientific papers of February 2021 in the Nature Index journals. The study has been covered by more than 280 online news outlets. It’s reached an estimated audience on Twitter of almost 6 million.

Professor Rusty Brainard, Chief Environment Officer at the Red Sea Development Company (TRSDC) and Courtesy Professor of Marine Science at the KAUST’S Red Sea Research Center has been recognized among Cityscape’s top 20 real estate industry climate change champions.

RSRC ALUMNI JOINED THE RED SEA DEVELOPMET COMPANY (TRSDC)

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Dr. Eva Aylagas

Dr. Royale Hardenstine

Dr. Michael Campbell

Current position

Current position

Current position

Senior Coral Science Manager

Protected Species Science Manager

Geographic Information Systems Manager

Dr. Susann Rossbach Current position

Dr. Cecilia Martin Current position

Dr. Luis Silva Current position

Environmental Chemical Science Manager

Habitat Enhancement Science Manager

Microbiology Manager

INTO THE RED SEA:

IMAGES FROM A LIVING LABORATORY

Morgan Bennett-Smith MSc Class of 2020

“Shoot Away”. That’s what Professor Mike Berumen told me on my first boat trip in the Red Sea in the summer of 2018.We were onboard the “Dream Master”, in the midst of the Reef Ecology Lab’s Eid Research Cruise. I mentioned to Mike that I was interested in taking a “few” underwater pictures during the trip, and, to my surprise, Mike didn’t seem worried about the potential inverse relationship between my photographic and thesis data outputs.

With Mike’s blessing, I did take a few photos over the course of that first trip–and I took a few more over the next few months.

Months turned to years, and when I left KAUST in 2020, I had taken about 375,000 photos in the Red Sea. ‘Into the Red Sea’ is a collection of a few of those photos, with accompanying text written by Mike, me, and a whole host of Red Sea Research Center students, professors, alumni, postdocs and other “friends of the center”. It was truly a collaborative effort, and hopefully, it will be a way for us to look back in time at a few snapshots of life and research in KAUST waters.And, for those who have never been fortunate enough to experience KAUST waters, ITRS might be a window to that world.

Thanks to everyone who helped make this book a reality. We couldn’t have done it without you!

Into the Red Sea is currently available for purchase from the Matjar shop at KAUST.

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A MILESTONE IN SAUDI SCIENTIFIC DIVING

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he development of a highly skilled workforce—a crucial part of Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030—recently took a new step forward through the country’s first in-Kingdom international scientific research diver certification of a Saudi.

Diver Saeed Amin, who is a KAUST marine science PhD student from the Biological Oceanography Lab in the University’s Red Sea Research Center, completed and passed the rigorous American Academy of Underwater Sciences (AAUS)-accredited KAUST Scientific Research Diver Certification in November 2020. The advanced course is the first of its kind conducted in the Kingdom, with Saudi Arabia now having its own home-grown, globally accredited scientific diving capabilities.

“I’m proud to be the first Saudi to become an AAUS-KAUST certified scientific research diver,” Amin said. “Receiving the certification is an amazing achievement in my academic life, as I obtained it from a unique educational institution like KAUST. The certification is also an important bridge that helps and facilitates my current fieldwork and my future scientific research and career.

On a wider level, the course is a great opportunity for any student or researcher interested in studying marine environments.”

A UNIQUE PROGRAM The AAUS/KAUST Scientific Research Diver Certification was introduced on campus in February 2020 by the University’s Coastal and Marine Resources Core Lab (CMR), providing an opportunity for KAUST to greatly advance scientific diving proficiency in the Kingdom. CMR is currently the only facility in Saudi Arabia certified to conduct the AAUS-accredited course, making it unique in its ability to train scientists to perform underwater marine research for applications ranging from industry to protecting the environment.

Operating an AAUS-certified program in Saudi Arabia comes after a decade of CMR’s work in influencing, educating, training and developing scientific diving standards in the country. CMR’s collaboration with the Saudi Water Sports & Diving Federation provides an opportunity for KAUST to advise at the highest levels of scientific diver regulations in the Kingdom.

Saeed Amin

RSRC PhD Student Becoming AAUS-accredited is no easy task. To be certified to teach the AAUS-accredited standard of scientific diving training, an institution must first have a chartered dive control board, a scientific dive safety manual and a designated scientific dive safety officer.Then, a tailored diver training course must be written and approved, and the dive safety officer must be accredited to teach.

CMR’s Scientific Diving Officer and Master Instructor David John Pallett worked hard to develop a peer-reviewed diver training course. Pallett is now the first and only AAUS scientific diver trainer instructor in Saudi Arabia.

The accredited course provides 100 hours of intense, advanced training over 12 days, which take place on top of the standard open water training for recreational diving. To date, KAUST has now certified a number of students through the program, with the amount due to increase as COVID-19 restrictions are lifted and close-proximity training is resumed.

ADVANCED QUALIFICATIONS “To take part in the course, become certified and carry out meaningful scientific diving work, students do not necessarily have to have vast experience in diving—or even be strong swimmers,” Pallett noted.

“On day one, I turned up [for the course] and admitted that I couldn’t swim,”Amin said.“To me, this seemed like a deal breaker.

How could I get to such an advanced stage of diving without being able to swim? Luckily for me, I had David and his certified scientific diving assistant, Susann Rossbach, who took me by the hand and taught me everything—a massive journey from learning how to swim to learning how to dive at an incredibly advanced level.”

Pallett appreciated the help of Rossbach in training the scientific diving students. She worked extensively with him throughout the course while she finished her KAUST PhD in marine science.

David John Pallett (standing), KAUST scientific diving officer and master instructor, provides classroom instruction as part of the University’s scientific research diving course Photo © Susann Rossbach 24

“Susann worked throughout the entire course as my right hand to help get students through the program,” Pallett said. “She will be an asset to her new role in the Kingdom as an environmental chemical science manager.”

“During the course, whenever we returned to the KAUST shore, I was excited for training the next day,” added Amin. “One of the best parts of the course was the teamwork and enthusiasm—you could feel the positive energy from each member of the team.”

REACHING OUT TO THE KINGDOM

After completion of the course, divers are qualified to help others in emergencies; perform advanced CPR; and carry out Emergency First Response, advanced oxygen administration and safe automated external defibrillator use. Divers are also able to deal with decompression sickness, or the bends, and arterial gas embolisms, and they even receive an introduction to Hyperlite hyperbaric stretcher methodology.

"Now that we have one Saudi national trained to such a high standard, Saeed can go on to further continued advanced scientific diver education—eventually to instructor level, if he chooses— where he will be able to pass on his experience by training others," Pallett said. "This is what makes KAUST and its 12 Core Labs stand out—the University and its facilities invest in the future of the students and, by default, that of the Kingdom, the wider region and the world."

The work that trained scientific divers are able to carry out in extreme marine environments includes seabed scientific research; the recovery of scientific instrumentation; commandeering and assisting a remotely operated underwater vehicle; and assisting in the recovery of an aircraft black box.

"The certification is an outstanding tool that allows divers to study the marine environment," Amin said. "Scientific research diving is strongly connected to environmental conservation programs that protect marine environments and ecosystems. The Red Sea provides a unique environment for studying and investigating factors that promote the growth and adaptability of marine species that sustain the Red Sea's ecosystem."

For KAUST and the Kingdom, the course meets a real need for Saudi citizens to lead in their marine science fields of expertise.

"Having local talent trained to such a high standard provides fantastic opportunities for the transfer of education to other institutions in the Kingdom," Rossbach stated. "This is only the beginning of KAUST's work in scientific diving."

"Looking to the future, KAUST has the opportunity to build on the course's success, expand access to it and certify more Saudi nationals," said Lloyd Smith, CMR lab director. "Students from across Saudi Arabia and further afield may now realize their ambitions in underwater research, placing Saudi Arabia on the map for scientific diving for the first time in history."

Read this story and more on KAUST News here.

Divers seeking certification from KAUST’s American Academy of Underwater Sciencesaccredited scientific research diving course practice assisting during an on-deck emergency.

Photo © Dacid John Pallett

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WILL PROBIOTICS SAVE CORALS OR HARM THEM? - By Elizabeth Svoboda Scientific American

Photo © Morgan Bennett-Smith

M

anta rays and whitetip reef sharks glide past socially distanced

visitors at Rio de Janeiro’s hangar-sized AquaRio aquarium.

In a laboratory upstairs, above the main gallery, a new experiment is underway, one that marine scientists hope will enhance the survival prospects of the world’s coral reefs.

Twenty rectangular aquarium tanks, each about 20 centimeters wide, are arranged in a grid on the fourth floor. Each one houses a colorful assortment of coral fragments.The researchers will treat some tanks with cocktails of probiotics, a mix of bacteria designed to promote resilience under tough conditions.

Researcher João Rosado draws murky liquid into a pipette, then stands over the first tank and carefully depresses the plunger, squirting the mixture into the seawater.“Can you see that, like smoke?” says Rosado’s colleague Pedro Cardoso of the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (both are currently master's students at the RSRC, KAUST), through his face mask.“Those are the bacteria.”

Cardoso is talking to me over a live video feed the team set up so I could witness the proceedings remotely. The gray bacterial cloud surrounds the coral like a shroud, settling on it. Later, Rosado will treat other tanks with probiotic-filled rotifers—microscopic marine animals that corals eat with their tiny mouths. Corals in a third set of tanks will get both treatments, and those in a fourth set will get none. The investigators will probe the various corals over the coming weeks to see if any of the regimens improve coral health.

The use of rotifers is a new attempt to get “good bacteria” to corals in distress. The results from the December 2020 experiment will help inform biologists’ intention to apply probiotics to reefs in the wild in hopes of improving their chances of surviving the high temperatures and disease outbreaks that are overwhelming them.

Rosado and Cardoso’s trial—led by marine biologist Gustavo Duarte—builds on work by their mentor, Porf. Raquel Peixoto, who published the first probiotics experiments in 2015. She is a leader of the audacious and controversial rescue plan to administer probiotics in the ocean, which could change the ecosystem. Peixoto will apply probiotics in the Red Sea later this year, and conservation groups are eagerly exploring the concept. Although Peixoto and her contemporaries have conducted many lab experiments and will carefully restrict the first open-ocean tests, she says corals are so threatened it is “time for us to take some risks.”

Coral reefs cover nearly 285,000 square kilometers of ocean floor worldwide. They are largely concentrated into a dozen major chains, but they exert a global influence on marine and human life. Almost a quarter of marine species spend at least some part of their lives there.The reefs dampen storm surges and waves that can tear apart shorelines.They feed millions of people and account for almost $20 billion annually in global tourism.

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Yet the world’s corals are in a state of possibly terminal decline.

Scientists first observed mass coral bleaching—a sign of starvation—in 1983, and by the 1990s they had started to link bleaching to changing sea temperatures. Between 1987 and 2019, oceans warmed 450 percent more than they did between 1955 and 1986.

Since 1980, 94 percent of coral reefs have experienced at least one episode of severe bleaching. The Great Barrier Reef has suffered three such events in the past five years. A report from the United Nations Environment Program estimates that largely because of ocean warming, most of the planet’s reefs will suffer annual severe bleaching by 2034 and, without intervention, will be gone entirely by 2100. Global reef death most likely will continue even if countries begin to get their carbon emissions under control.To reverse the trend, “we have a very narrow window of time—basically a decade,” says Carlos M. Duarte, Distinguished Professor at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) in Saudi Arabia. “The window is rapidly closing.”

Some experts worry that certain bacteria could accidentally spawn new coral disease outbreaks, a possibility that arose in a recent lab test. And no one knows exactly how the treatments will affect ocean life further up the food chain, such as fish and crabs that feed on coral polyps.

As with climate change, however, the global prospects for reefs have become so dire that many conservationists think extreme fixes are needed. “It’s not a good position for scientists to be [in],” says Peixoto, now an associate professor at the RSRC, KAUST. But she says the decision is clear. “We have to act. Otherwise, it’s going to be too late.”

REEF REPAIR Researchers have been trying to restore damaged reefs since the 1970s. In 2000 Baruch Rinkevich of Israel’s National Institute of Oceanography started one of the first nurseries to raise young corals and transplant them onto reefs that had suffered damage from fishing, diving or storms.

Scientists started looking into specific fixes for bleaching a few years after that. In 2010 researchers at Florida’s Mote Marine Laboratory showed that by chipping fragments off of healthy corals in lab tanks they could trigger a Herculean growth response that promptly turns those fragments into full-fledged baby corals. (Corals can reproduce sexually by releasing eggs and sperm into the ocean or asexually by budding—essentially, cloning.) In 2018 and 2019 researchers in Mexico and Israel used the Mote team’s strategy to generate coral fragments and transplant them onto reefs just off Mexico’s Pacific coast. The new corals that grew from them showed an impressive survival rate of about 60 percent, despite the damaging effects of Hurricane Willa. On Florida’s reefs, corals the Mote team has grown from fragments merged into larger colonies that in 2020 began successfully spawning in the wild.

Scientists developing probiotics see the treatments as more than a stopgap to postpone reef death. They think probiotics have a real chance to reverse some damage that has already been done, enabling once threatened corals to flourish and strengthening new human-bred corals that are transplanted onto ailing reefs. “It sounds so radical,” says Rebecca Vega Thurber, a marine microbial ecologist at Oregon State University. But, she adds, “with proper experimental design and application, it could be helpful.”

Big questions still need answers. When applied at sea, will probiotics wash away? Would the labor-intensive techniques cost huge sums of money when tried across reefs hundreds of kilometers long? And even the most avid backers acknowledge the risk they are running. In some ways, reef treatments sound a bit like geoengineering—sprinkling iron into the sea to encourage growth of algae that soak up carbon dioxide or spraying aerosols into the air to reflect the sun’s rays back to space, lessening global warming.

Seeding reefs with bacteria might alter the ocean ecosystem at a fundamental level.

Bleached corals, such as these on the Great Barrier Reef outside Cairns, Australia, are vulnerable to starvation and disease that can lead to death. © Brett Monroe Garner Getty Images

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Photo © Khulud Muath

Professor Raquel Peixoto RSRC Associate Professor

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Breeding is another strategy. Since at least 2015 researchers at the Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS) and elsewhere have been trying in labs to selectively breed so-called super corals, which carry genes that help the animals withstand stress.Teams at the institute and the University of Hawaii’s Gates Coral Lab are creating these ultraresilient corals using “assisted evolution,” which involves selecting wild corals with desirable genetic traits, such as the ability to survive high ocean temperatures, then cross-breeding them to yield offspring with an abundance of the traits. In a 2020 lab study at AIMS, temperature-tolerant corals created this way proved up to 26 times more likely to survive extreme heat than other corals.

As a kid on vacation, Peixoto snorkeled the Brazilian reefs near Bahia, entranced by the vivid universe beneath her. On dives as an adult, she saw that universe disintegrating. Corals were turning into lifeless skeletons; the ones that were hanging on looked wan and sickly.“Every year is getting worse,” she says.“You dive and see 90 percent of the species dead.” Peixoto resolved to do something transformative, something that could revive wild corals.“We want to protect the diversity already there in the reef,” she says,“to make sure colonies can survive.“

Yet another approach to helping corals is to enhance reproduction. In 2017 a team at the California Academy of Sciences, the Nature Conservancy and SECORE International, a conservation organization, began catching the eggs and sperm that healthy spawning corals release in the wild on rare but predictable nights.

The researchers complete the fertilization in the lab, then transplant larvae onto needy reefs.

She had a novel starting point in mind. In a 2010 experiment aimed at developing an alternative to the hazardous chemicals used to clean up oil spills in Brazilian mangroves, her team demonstrated that oil-sucking bacteria could break down the oil and promote plant health and growth.What if she could summon concentrated bacterial reinforcements to protect coral reefs? No one had tried probiotics, but she had a hunch they might work.

These techniques share a daunting drawback: restoration workers have to manipulate corals in a lab and refine ways to transplant them onto struggling reefs, a slow and costly process. It could be quicker and more affordable if a therapeutic could be administered directly to ailing corals in the wild.That prospect helped to lead researchers such as Peixoto to probiotics.And, theoretically at least, selectively bred lab corals, or chipped fragments, could also be treated with probiotics to make them more resistant to heat and disease before they are transplanted in the sea.

As a first move, Peixoto harvested tissue and seawater from the surfaces of local corals.Then she sequenced the bacterial genes in that mix to find species that carry out functions promoting survival. She grew the native microbes in culture and mixed bespoke cocktails for each reef environment. Her work paid off in late 2018, when she and her colleagues published a study showing that their tailored probiotic blend helped corals survive hot aquarium temperatures and resist disease.

Coral formations are constellations of thousands of animals called polyps, each often smaller than a pinky fingernail. Every polyp hosts a variety of bacteria, algae, fungi and other microorganisms, collectively known as its microbiome. Like microbes in the human gut, these tiny residents carry out tasks that keep the whole system functioning. In recent years metagenomic analysis—sequencing the genes of the microbes on a polyp—has supplied a clearer picture of which tasks the microbes are performing. Scientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute, and elsewhere have isolated bacteria that consume excess nitrogen, preventing nearby algal blooms that starve coral of nutrients. Other microorganisms degrade reactive oxygen species— molecules that damage coral cells—or help corals capture carbon for energy. Much as microbes in the human gut help to break down food, contributing to our nutrition and health, researchers theorize that beneficial coral microbes make the hosts more resilient to environmental stresses by supporting their overall health and warding off polyp disease and tissue loss.

As ocean temperatures rise, however, the microbial relationships within corals start to break down. Scientists at Oregon State University have found that bacterial communities on stressed corals often become unstable, potentially giving disease-causing microbes a chance to spread. Warming oceans, together with ocean acidification caused by higher carbon dioxide levels, also disrupt the microbe-aided calcification process that gives corals their structure, making it harder for them to repair damage. At the same time, stressed polyps expel their Symbiodinium algae, which turn sunlight into food for polyps, leaving them without a food source.

This gives corals a characteristic bleached appearance that biologists recognize as a sign of doom because bleached polyps are also more vulnerable to disease. Peixoto has witnessed this alarming transformation firsthand.

A DISINTEGRATING UNIVERSE

One of Peixoto’s newest experiments, being reviewed by journals, goes deeper, appearing to show distinct mechanisms that probiotics may use to enhance corals’ health. Her team in Brazil placed four finger-length coral segments in each of 20 small tanks and assembled a cocktail of six bacterial strains from healthy Mussismilia hispida, a common South Atlantic coral. Every few days they removed a few segments, dripped a dot of probiotics onto their surfaces, and returned them to the tanks. Next they raised the water temperature on half the tanks.

The results weeks later were dramatic: more than a third of the control corals had died, but almost all the treated corals were alive.

Detailed analysis revealed multiple ways the probiotics appeared to promote health.The treated corals less strongly expressed genes linked to inflammation.They also showed less gene activity related to cell death.That means corals “can even bleach, but it’s not to the extent that they lose tissue,” Peixoto says.“The probiotics provide them with this kind of buffer.”That buffer could give other restoration measures—such as super-coral breeding or spawning baby corals from fragments—a better chance to work. The right probiotics applied in the lab before transplantation could potentially increase the corals’ odds of survival.

Read the full article on Scientific American here.

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STUDENT FOCUS:

SILVIA VIMERCATI PhD student Habitat and Benthic Biodiversity (HaBB) Lab - By Catarina Carrão

D

uring the past two decades, the development of sophisticat-

ed molecular technologies and instruments for research has resulted in significant advances in biological sciences, and we can now understand the natural world in extraordinary ways.

Of course, there is still much to learn, particularly about the biological evolution in the marine environment, which plays a crucial role in understanding the origin of life on Earth and the complex relationships between organisms.

As such, we caught up with Silvia Vimercati, a PhD student in the KAUST Habitat and Benthic Biodiversity (HaBB) Lab, who studies the unique relationships between stony corals (the Scleractinia) and coral-dwelling gall crabs (in the family Cryptochiridae).

She explained to us that coral-dwelling gall crabs cannot survive without stony corals, where these small crabs of less than 1 cm in size take up residence.

Cryptochiridae induce skeletal-modifications in their coral hosts, although according to Silvia, nobody can still know for sure what type of symbiotic relationship this is - commensal, mutualist, or parasitic. The question remains, is it “paying rent”, “worker living on premises”, or “illegal occupation”?

What seems certain is that the gall crab’s evolution is influenced by the coral’s evolution, since the co-evolutionary events observed between these two species were traced to a sequential evolution, assuming the coral conditioned the crab.

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Silvia’s PhD study stems from her previous work studying the relationship between the gall crab Dacryomaia and their host corals around the Indo-Pacific Ocean. This work complements and supports the research previously done by her co-supervisor at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands.

In her Master’s thesis, Silvia found six species of gall crabs that were coral specialists, that is, they inhabit only specific coral species. One species that is not particular about its coral dwellings is labelled as a “super-generalist”, because it was found to inhabit ten different corals species, jumping geographically between the Saudi Arabian Red Sea, Maldives, Malaysia, Indonesia, Japan, and even Australia – that’s a “vagabond” gall crab (!).

Silvia was so excited with her previous results, that upon an invitation from Prof. Francesca Benzoni, she didn’t think twice, and she joined the HaBB lab in KAUST's Red Sea Research Center to develop a PhD study using bigger data sets related to co-evolution and co-speciation events between these two interesting marine creatures.

She sees this opportunity of living in Saudi Arabia as an interesting experience, going out of her comfort zone in a culture totally different from hers, but also as a way to follow her dreams. According to her own words, the international environment at KAUST makes it easy to adapt and to grow not only scientifically, but above all personally.

We look forward to read more about Silvia’s research in the future, and how (our knowledge of) the relationship between gall crabs and stony corals continues.

Photo © Anastasia Serin

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WORKING TOWARDS A SAFER FUTURE FOR OUR OCEANS - By Professor Raquel Peixoto For GreenBiz

T

he ocean’s stable health is an important component that

upholds the climate’s behavior and life on Earth. A key indicator of that health? Coral reefs, also known as the marine “canaries in the coal mine.”

Coral bleaching due to climate change is a major concern among ocean researchers. Record ocean temperatures during 2014-2017 triggered a mass bleaching event around the globe, a sign that this issue is becoming more dire.

Considering coral’s importance to the ocean ecosystem, this could lead to a vicious cycle of damage. Coral reefs along coast lines are critically important to both the fish and other organisms that live and/or depend on them and the human populations that rely on those organisms to sustain their economies and provide food.We have reached the point where we can no longer discuss “if ” but “when” and “which” coral reefs will need urgent assisted human interventions to be saved.

If the world aims to restore marine life in the next 20-30 years, or even less, the efforts need to consist of a combination of techniques ranging between CO2 mitigation solutions and looking into preserving, supporting and rehabilitating coral reefs.

WHAT WE CAN LEARN FROM THE RED SEA Corals hold unique significance for oceans and the world’s climate at large — they are home to 25 percent of marine life. They are also critically important to the costal communities they support with fishing and other activities. The ecological, economic and societal benefits globally have been estimated at $9.8 trillion, and close to a billion people depend on them for food and income.

Programs to predict and monitor coral bleaching events have been put into place because such events are so devastating to the broader ecosystem.

This all makes what’s happening in the Red Sea, and the work of the KAUST researchers who study it, so important.The Northern Red Sea, in particular, is home to resilient and temperature-resistant corals that are bucking global bleaching trends.

Temperatures of the Red Sea during summer average just above 32 degrees Celsius, a temperature that basically would kill corals in places such as the Caribbean or Australia’s Great Barrier Reef.

Research into understanding why Red Sea corals can survive these temperatures could be used to help corals elsewhere.Time is of the essence, as the fragility of most corals mean they would not survive the expected 2-3 degrees C increase in global temperatures predicted by the end of the century.

Photo © Khulud Muath 32

Professor Raquel Peixoto RSRC Associate Professor

Photo © KAUST

THE KEY TO SAVING CORAL REEFS WORLDWIDE

AN EXAMPLE FOR THE WORLD

Corals hold unique significance for oceans and the world’s climate at large — they are home to 25 percent of marine life.They are also critically important to the costal communities they support with fishing and other activities.The ecological, economic and societal benefits globally have been estimated at $9.8 trillion, and close to a billion people depend on them for food and income. Programs to predict and monitor coral bleaching events have been put into place because such events are so devastating to the broader ecosystem.

KAUST researchers are also hoping to attract ecotourists to visit conserved and well-managed reefs and to develop coral reef protection, recovery and rehabilitation projects in the Red Sea. The results will then become models that could be replicated in other parts of the world, serving both as a teaching tool and local economic benefit.

This all makes what’s happening in the Red Sea, and the work of the KAUST researchers who study it, so important.The Northern Red Sea, in particular, is home to resilient and temperature-resistant corals that are bucking global bleaching trends.

Temperatures of the Red Sea during summer average just above 32 degrees Celsius, a temperature that basically would kill corals in places such as the Caribbean or Australia’s Great Barrier Reef.

Research into understanding why Red Sea corals can survive these temperatures could be used to help corals elsewhere.Time is of the essence, as the fragility of most corals mean they would not survive the expected 2-3 degrees C increase in global temperatures predicted by the end of the century.

Besides their efforts in Saudi Arabia, KAUST researchers have been discussing the use of coral probiotics in conservation projects in Brazil, with organizations such as the World Wildlife Fund, as well as hotels and tourism companies that plan to have coral nurseries and restoration efforts.

RSRC researchers are also studying other aspects of the Red Sea’s unique ecology — such as mangroves that can remove and store carbon — to access discoveries that can be applied to the global fight against climate change.

Ultimately, the oceans — and specifically the unique environment of the Red Sea — can tell researchers much about how to mitigate global climate change effects by protecting and restoring marine life. Given its importance to life in the ocean, corals may just be the key to something much bigger.

Read this story and more on GreenBiz here.

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KAUST RESEARCH CONFERENCE: OCEAN CARBON AND BIOGEOCHEMISTRY IN TROPICAL SEAS

T

he RSRC virtual conference on “Ocean Carbon and Biogeochemistry in tropical seas” was co-organized

by Dr. Malika Kheireddine and Professor Burton Jones.

The three-day virtual research conference took place on April 6-8 and was open to everyone around the world.

The conference was a great success. In total, we had 200 participants, 27 speakers and 100 kids from the TKS involved.

The conference addressed the different components of the ocean carbon pump; discussed what challenges remain in identifying and quantifying these pumps; and evaluated integrated, state-of-the-art observational and modeling approaches to resolving processes specifically in the tropical ocean.

If you are curious about it or did not have a chance to register, you can still access the talks from our conference channel.

Watch here.

Keynote speakers Dr. Hervé Claustre

Senior Scientist, Laboratoire d’Océanographie de Villefranche (LOV), France

Professor Mohammad Qurban

Executive Chairman, National Center for Wildlife Development, Saudi Arabia

Dr. Sarah L.C. Giering

Researcher, Ocean Biogeochemistry and Ecosystems, National Oceanography Centre Southampton, UK

Professor David Siegel

Distinguished Professor, Department of Geography, Marine Science Institute, UC Santa Barbara, USA

Professor Stein Kaartvedt

Professor of Marine Science, Department of Biosciences, University of Oslo, Norway

Dr. Zouhair Lachkar

Senior Scientist, Center for Prototype Climate Modeling (CPCM), NYU Abu Dhabi, UAE

Professor Xosé Anxelu G. Morán

Research Professor, Spanish Institute of Oceanography (IEO), Spain; Adjunct Associate Professor of Marine Science, KAUST, Saudi Arabia

Dr. Malika Kheireddine

Research Scientist, Red Sea Research Center, KAUST, Saudi Arabia 34

Illustration by Ima Ferri Sanz

Organizing Committee Members Professor Burton Jones Dr. Malika Kheireddine Aislinn Dunne

Professor Xosé Anxelu G. Morán Dr. Anders Rostad Christine Nelson

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RSRC GRADUATES

Michelle-Nicole Havlik

Milica Predragovic

Anieka Parry

Karla Gonzalez Martinez MSc Graduate

MSc Graduate

PI: Professor Carlos Duarte

PI: Professor Michael Berumen

PI: Professor Carlos Duarte

PI: Professor Michael Berumen

PI: Professor Michael Berumen

MSc Graduate

Mikaela Justo

MSc Graduate

Kiana Ford

Gloria Gil Ramos

Irene Salinas-Akhmadeeva

Anna Knochel

MSc Graduate

MSc Graduate

MSc Graduate

MSc Graduate

PI: Professor Michael Berumen

PI: Professor Michael Berumen

PI: Professor Michael Berumen

PI: Professor Michael Berumen

PI: Professor Michael Berumen

Jessica Menzies

Viktoria Golding

Kelly Watson

Rodrigo Villalobos

MSc Graduate

MSc Graduate

MSc Graduate

PhD Graduate

PhD Graduate

PI: Professor Manuel Aranda

PI: Professor Manuel Aranda

PI: Professor Manuel Aranda

PI: Professor Michael Berumen

PI: Professor Christina Voolstra

MSc Graduate

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MSc Graduate

Viktor Nunes Peinemann

Carol Buitrago Lopez

RSRC NEW PEOPLE

Dr. Jesse Cochran

Dr. Samir M. Al Jbour

Dr. Erika Santoro

Carolina Bocanegra Castano

Research Scientist

Postdoctoral Fellow

Postdoctoral Fellow

Laboratory Technician

Reham Alansari

Cristina Alcon Giner

Megan Nolan

Susanne Bähr

Laboratory Technician

Molecular Laboratory Technician

PhD Student

PhD Student

Marta Ezetta Watts

Sarah Alghamdi

MSc Student

MSc Student 37

Contact Us rsrc.info@kaust.edu.sa seda.gasparyan@kaust.edu.sa www.rsrc.kaust.edu.sa Red Sea Research Center (RSRC) King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) Ibn Al-Haytham (building 2) Thuwal 23955-6900 Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

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Photo © Amr Gusti