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COral Reef Airborne Laboratory (CORAL)


The three-year COral Reef Airborne Laboratory (CORAL) mission will survey a portion of the world’s coral reefs to assess the condition of these threatened ecosystems.
Credit: NOAA/NMFS/PIFSC/CRED Oceanography Team. Download this image (JPG, 1.3 MB).
[03-Jun-16] NASA's COral Reef Airborne Laboratory (CORAL) field campaign kicks off its data-gathering phase with an operational readiness test in Hawaii on June 6. Over the next year, CORAL will conduct airborne and in-water surveys of representative coral reefs from Hawaii to Australia.

By focusing on entire reef ecosystems, scientists will get state-of-the-art insights into how biological, physical and chemical processes shape and affect reef environments. These data will help answer fundamental questions about how reefs are changing globally due to the effects of climate change and human activities. Read more here.