Why scientists are using corals from other countries to help save Florida's reefs

toggle caption Lauren Sommer/NPR

In a lab at the University of Miami, there are tanks of knobby, tan-colored corals from Florida, Honduras and the Cayman Islands. They've been drafted into a sort of coral Olympics, as scientists look for the ones that can best survive increasingly hotter ocean temperatures driven by climate change.

Over the past two years, 80% of the world's reefs saw dangerous levels of heat, which causes coral to bleach, turning a ghostly white color.

Florida's reefs are on the front line of the crisis. Corals there bleached again this summer, and already more than 90% of the living coral off the Florida Keys has died. So for decades, the focus has been on restoring reefs by growing and planting coral in the ocean, much like replanting a forest.

toggle caption Coral Restoration Foundation

It's one of the largest coral restoration efforts in the world. But after much of the restored coral near Florida died in the recent marine heat wave, restoration groups have had to overhaul their strategy.

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Scientists are now trying to breed corals that can tolerate heat better, speeding up the natural process of evolution. Florida coral has been crossbred with coral from Honduras, creating what researchers call "Flonduran" corals.