Cryptic.

My work station for the day (WHOI is closed
for inclement weather).

Right now, I am sitting cross-legged on a semi-circular orange armchair. Dark wood panels sandwich me on two walls, while the other two hold large glass windows to the outside world. It's getting white out there. Fat, wet flakes of snow started falling a few hours ago, and it shows no sign of stopping. 

To my right, a four-log fire provides cozy, comforting heat to the dark-paneled den. My husband clacks on a keyboard behind me, and to my left, our overgrown floof of a dog naps on the floor. It is winter in New England. 

If you asked me about coral reefs right now, I might not even know what you're talking about. As far as I'm concerned, the world is white and cold, like the ice planet Hoth. All I want in the world is my family and this fire. What are the tropics? From my orange armchair, the hot, humid latitudes feel a galaxy away. 

Nevertheless, I was roused from my cozy winter stupor by an email today. A paper that I had contributed to about cryptic lineages in corals was published online! If you've never heard the term "cryptic lineage" before, think about a large family - all the individuals are closely related, in fact much more closely related to one another than members of other families. They might have distinct facial features, but otherwise, they look like perfectly normal people. Cryptic lineages are genetically distinct groups of corals. They look like the same species - even I can't tell them apart - but when you check out their DNA, you'll notice they cluster into distinct groups.  

What's cool about coral cryptic lineages is that in most cases, different lineages are good at different things. Some can tolerate high temperatures really well; some thrive in turbid waters or at high latitudes; still others work well at depth. Different lineages within a species can survive in different conditions - and that bodes pretty well for the future of coral reefs. 

Cas was so inspired by our work on cryptic lineages of Porites lobata in Palau that he decided to dig into the literature and figure out how wide-spread cryptic lineages were in corals in general. Turns out, they're everywhere. There's a study published about cryptic lineages in almost every genus of corals on the planet. Understanding how cryptic lineages work is really important for coral conservation in a changing climate. 

I was glad to contribute to this important perspective paper and help advance scientific thought about cryptic lineages in corals. You can read the paper here in Nature Ecology and Evolution.