Human pathogen killing corals in the Florida Keys (wild)

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With funding from Florida's Mote Marine Laboratory "Protect Our Reefs" grant program, Sutherland, Lipp and Porter conducted challenge experiments by inoculating fragments of coral with the strain found in both humans and corals to see if it would cause disease. The experiments were carried out in a laboratory in closed seawater tanks to eliminate any risk of infection to wild populations of corals.

"The strain caused disease in elkhorn coral in five days, so we now have definitive evidence that humans are a source of the pathogen that causes this devastating disease of corals," Sutherland said.

"These bacteria do not come from the ocean, they come from us," said Porter.

Human pathogen killing corals in the Florida Keys