“In efforts to give life to degraded reefs, researchers from San Diego have created a gel that draws coral larvae to settle on dying or artificial reefs.

The gel emits a scent that corals associate with healthy reefs. Coral larvae are picky about where they attach to, and if they fail to settle, they will be eaten by predators or washed out to sea.

When researchers from the University of California (UC) San Diego’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography coated a man-made surface in the lab with the gel, it drew about 20 times more coral babies than an untreated surface. 

The tank experiment involved one Hawaiian coral species – the stony Montipora capitata.”

From The Straits Times.