The mouth of a coral polyp (center): Symbiotic algae are labeled in red, pathogenic bacteria that enter through this region are labeled in blue. Disclaimer: AAAS and EurekAlert! are not ...

The larva grows into a coral polyp, then a colony that matures and releases larvae that colonize other rocks. In time, it helps to create one of nature’s most spectacular ecosystems: a coral reef.

An individual coral is a polyp. It’s a very small and simple creature consisting mostly of a stomach topped by a mouth, a bit like a hungry toddler. Corals take a very long time to grow.

Corals are made up of tiny living organisms called coral polyps, which attach themselves to the sea floor. When polyps die, they become hard, and new polyps grow on top of them. Gradually ...

Scientists race to protect coral polyps — and the fragile ecosystems they host — from becoming deep-sea ghost towns. Laura Boast Vividly coloured coral reefs are a beautiful backdrop in ...

But what exactly is coral bleaching, and why is this so damaging? We’ll explain everything you need to know, in a nutshell… Corals are tiny animals called a ‘polyps’, that typically live in large ...

https://doi.org/10.2307/1536652 • https://www.jstor.org/stable/1536652 Copy URL ...

Most hard corals grow thanks to a symbiotic relationship between the coral polyp and zooxanthellae - essentially algae - that through photosynthesis produce glucose, energy, to enable the hard corals ...