The Kinda Good News About Coral Peril ¡Viva la Science! Rising
carbon dioxide levels— and oh boy, do we haz them—lead to lower
pH in our oceans. The lower the pH, the more acidic the water.
Coral reefs, underwater structures notoriously unwilling to
relocate, are stuck dealing with the result. A new paper shows
that coral reefs that have been exposed to acidic waters are
less dense and more fragile. Springs underwater and the coral
reefs that live near them sustain other species. Marine
scientist and paper co-author Adina Paytan points out that it
could’ve been worse. “The good news is that they don't just
die,” she says, in what one can only imagine to be a hollowly
perky tone of voice. “They are able to grow and calcify, but
they are not producing robust structures.” Fortunately, what
she’s not saying is that the whole wide world of coral has gone
rickety. Scientists, being scientists, work hard to gather data
that lets them make predictions about what will happen. In this
case, the study focused on coral l