Taryn Foster, a marine biologist from the Abrolhos Islands located 40 miles away from the coast of Western Australia, states that it is an extraordinarily special part of the world.
There are no palm trees or rich vegetation present, however when in the water, a variety of tropical coral and fish will appear.
Polyps, animals that are mostly found in tropical waters, are the foundation of the corals we see today. These soft-bodied creatures create a hard outer shell by taking calcium carbonate from the ocean. Through the accumulation of these shells, a reef is formed.
Although occupying an area of less than 0.2% of the seafloor, coral reefs are home to over a quarter of marine species.
Nevertheless, the animals are vulnerable to heat and acidity so in recent times, due to the waters heating up and becoming more acidic, corals have become more prone to illness and mortality.
Ms Foster has observed bleaching first-hand, a process in which corals become discolored and turn white.
The Global Coral Reef Monitoring Network has warned that with a 1.5C rise in water temperature, there is a risk of major coral reef losses that could range from 70% to 90%.
It is predicted by some scientists that all will have disappeared by 2070.
Cathie Page from the Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS) believes climate change to be the major challenge for coral reefs across the planet.
Ms Page warns of the harmful implications of strong bleaching events brought on by global warming, admitting that effective measures have yet to be established.
Usually, coral restoration involves taking little corals that have been raised in nurseries and placing them on affected coral reefs.
The work, even though it can be sluggish and expensive, is only benefiting a small portion of the reefs that are in danger.
Ms Foster is testing a system at the Abrolhos Islands in the shallow waters, which she hopes will expedite the revival of reefs.
The technique entails taking pieces of coral and attaching them to small plugs, which are set into shaped bases. Then those bases are put in lots and laid down on the seafloor.
Ms Foster created the base, which is shaped like a disc with grooves and a handle, and is made from limestone-based concrete.
Ms Foster explains that they had wanted something which was easy for divers or remotely-operated vehicles to deploy and would be able to be produced in mass quantities at a reasonable cost.
The results have been encouraging up to this point.
"We have implemented various prototypes of our coral skeletons, and proceeded to trial them on four distinct species," she says. "They have all been developing exceptionally well."
She remarks that they are skipping several years of buildup that would usually be necessary to attain that base volume.
Ms Foster founded Coralmaker and is hoping that teaming up with Autodesk, a San Francisco-based engineering software firm, will speed up the process.
The researchers of theirs have educated an artificial intelligence to command collaborative robots (cobots), which collaborate with people in close proximity..
Ms Foster states that some of the coral propagation steps consist of repeating pick-and-place activities, making them suitable for robotic automation.
A robotic arm is capable of grafting and gluing coral fragments onto seed plugs, and can also use its vision systems to make decisions regarding the handling of the fragments when placing them in the base.
Nic Carey, senior principal research scientist at Autodesk, explains that each piece of coral is unique, even among the same species, and so the robots must be able to recognise the pieces and determine how to interact with them.
Thus far, they have proven to be adept at managing the variances in coral configurations.
Ms Foster believes the robots should be relocated from the lab in the coming 12-18 months.
Yet, the reality of the situation brings with it a number of difficulties: living coral needs to be handled carefully, even perhaps on a boat in motion, and saltwater may be dangerous to electronic devices.
Mr Carey declared that it is necessary to safeguard the more susceptible components.
The expense of this technology is quite considerable. Coralmaker is assuming that travel and leisure businesses will demand their goods, and is proposing biodiversity credits, similar to carbon credits, as compensation.
According to AIMS scientist Cathie Page, in order for coral reefs to have a chance of surviving in a warming future, a significant commitment of time, money, and human resources is necessary.
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Her organisation, as well as others, is looking into techniques such as coral seeding to facilitate more extensive restoration work.
In a laboratory setting, collecting and fertilising coral spawn is done, and the larvae are then nurtured into baby corals in a nursery. Once mature, they are planted onto corrupted reefs.
Ms Page states that mortality among corals during their first year is very high, thus coral seeding is used in order to raise the amount of juvenile corals on a reef, promoting their survival and progress.
The propagation of more resilient "super coral" is being considered, in addition to far-reaching solutions such as geo-engineering clouds to reflect sunlight and safeguard coral from the heat.
An encouraging development involves sound in relation to sea creatures living in reefs. These creatures produce a variety of sounds, such as chattering, cracking, and whooping.
Computers have been educated to analyse aquatic sound recordings and are capable of recognizing patterns that demonstrate a reef's level of health. In Australia, the AIMS has expanded upon this with their Reef Song research project. Here, loudspeakers are positioned on damaged reefs and play healthy sounds that will hopefully bring fish and increase reef restoration.
Ms. Page believes that, although daunting, effort can be made to remedy one of the most complex ecological issues on Earth. She maintains her optimism in spite of the challenge.
It should be kept in mind that there is no simple answer that will solve everything.
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