We're delighted to announce that Dr. Laura Marcina @lauramacrina.bsky.social is joining our team as a Subject Editor!

Read all about her expertise here: bdj.pensoft.net/news/1112

Grateful to all my co-authors and the expedition leaders that allowed us to sample for this study and made this work possible 🪸

This study provides:
- A reference collection for octocoral research in the Red Sea
- New insights into mesophotic and deep-sea biodiversity, still largely unexplored, as well as 10 new records for the Red Sea
- A foundation for biodiversity assessments in this rapidly developing region

Here, we present the first comprehensive molecular assessment of octocoral diversity in the Saudi Arabian Red Sea, harnessing sampling efforts spanning the latitudinal extension of the basin and more than 800 m depths.

The hidden diversity of Saudi Arabian Red Sea octocorals revealed through a morpho-molecular assessment across bathymetric and latitudinal gradients - Scientific Reports Scientific Reports - The hidden diversity of Saudi Arabian Red Sea octocorals revealed through a morpho-molecular assessment across bathymetric and latitudinal gradients

Our manuscript "The hidden diversity of Saudi Arabian Red Sea octocorals revealed through a morpho-molecular assessment across bathymetric and latitudinal gradients", based on the results of my first PhD chapter, is now available open access in Scientific Reports: www.nature.com/articles/s41...

a close up of what looks like a tuft of flower buds that are pale blue and pearly gray that are radiating from a thick white base as if it's an unusual stationary sea creature

a heavy white trunk is erupting from a dirty yellow base to support crinkly pink nodules along its stubby arms somewhat like an illustration of a stylized tree

there is a highly irregular, almost velvet-like green palm-shaped surface covered in warts of tissue that seems like it's attached to a sturdy white base as if it was a sea creature that lives stationary on a rock

Scientists have completed the largest survey of soft coral diversity ever conducted. Their results show that soft corals have been radiating in a small corner of what was once a giant sea.

🪸 Story: www.floridamuseum.ufl.edu/science/worl...

Study: www.nature.com/articles/s41...

World’s soft coral diversity retains signature of an ancient, vanished sea It is of vital importance to, on occasion, consider how little we know about the spinning rock we all live on. Take coral reefs, for example. Given how much they’ve been studied, you’d think we’ve lea...

www.floridamuseum.ufl.edu/science/worl...

A 7 panel figure showing Madracis interjecta in various forms, growing in a bioherm formation and as an individual colony. The 6th panel shows a colony being sampled by the arm of an ROV, and the last panel shows a close up of a branch under a Scanning Electron Microscope.

Our article is out in Ecology and Evolution! We use SDMs to model the habitat distribution of the coral Madracis interjecta in the mesophotic/ deep Red Sea. We also found Madracis bioherms to occur in deeper and cooler waters than the individual colonies 🦑🪸
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...

Biodiversity and biogeography of zooxanthellate soft corals across the Indo-Pacific - Scientific Reports Scientific Reports - Biodiversity and biogeography of zooxanthellate soft corals across the Indo-Pacific

New paper by MISE octocoral crazy collectors and friends!! @lauramacrina.bsky.social

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Biodiversity and biogeography of zooxanthellate soft corals across the Indo-Pacific - Scientific Reports Scientific Reports - Biodiversity and biogeography of zooxanthellate soft corals across the Indo-Pacific

Honoured to have contributed to this amazing work led by Professor McFadden! 🪸

Biodiversity and biogeography of zooxanthellate soft corals across the Indo-Pacific is now out on Scientific Reports and available open access at:

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

A Small And Beautiful Seahorse Reveals An Even Smaller And Reclusive Worm | Defector Years ago, as a student at the University of the Ryukyus in in Okinawa, Japan, Ai Takahata was researching the color patterns of a seahorse about the size of a shelled peanut. The pygmy seahorse Hippo...

I wrote about a delightful study about the secret dynamics of a coral, some seahorses, and oodles of tiny worms
defector.com/a-small-and-...