Articles tagged: zooxanthellae
- Deep dive
Zooxanthellae and the coral symbiosis
A deep dive into the relationship between a coral and its endosymbiotic algae: the biology and genera of Symbiodiniaceae, nutrient exchange and light-enhanced calcification, regulation of symbiont density, the mechanism of bleaching and the scientific debate around it — and what all of it means in the aquarium.
- Deep dive
Coral Color and Pigments — from GFP proteins to zooxanthellae density
Why corals are colourful, how fluorescent proteins and chromoproteins work, how light and nutrients drive colour, and what bleaching reveals about the pigment system.
- Basics
Lighting — the role of light in a reef aquarium
Why corals need light, what PAR and DLI mean in practice, and how to choose the right lighting level for different coral types.
- Deep dive
Lighting — zooxanthellae, the Stokes shift and photoacclimation
Cell-level light physiology: zooxanthellae, chlorophyll absorption peaks, the Stokes shift, photoacclimation and photoinhibition.
- Practice
Light is not set by eye — the PAR meter in practice
What PAR and cPUR measure, why LED lighting requires measurement, species-specific reference values and the principles of light acclimatisation.