Baer Jason L, Hartmann Aaron C, Rohwer Forest
Department of Biology, San Diego State University, San Diego, CA, USA.
Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA.
Nat Ecol Evol. 2025 Jun 30. doi: 10.1038/s41559-025-02741-4.
Coral reefs provide crucial ecosystem services to over 1 billion people globally and this intense pressure is causing their decline. Despite substantial investments in coral restoration and gradual advancements in coral propagation techniques, efforts focused on these ecosystem engineers are not yet fully restoring the ecological functions necessary for thriving reefs. This Perspective provides a road map for how to apply control theory to coral reef restoration, leveraging the framework's proven effectiveness for optimizing the growth of crops and expanding it to a complex ecosystem. An in situ mesocosm called Coral Reef Arks is used as a platform to test control interventions and refine the approach. Four field experiments using Coral Reef Arks show how control interventions are used to alter ecological and environmental conditions and guide reef state factors towards desired targets. The results from these tests identify control interventions and parameter relationships that are integrated into predictive models to determine the scale at which to intervene on natural reefs. By using real-time ecological feedback, this control-based framework offers a path to identify precise, adaptable interventions that go beyond static conservation methods, providing a dynamic approach to maintain and enhance reef function in the face of ongoing environmental changes.
珊瑚礁为全球超过10亿人提供关键的生态系统服务，而这种巨大压力正导致其衰退。尽管在珊瑚修复方面投入巨大，且珊瑚繁殖技术也在逐步进步，但针对这些生态系统工程师的努力尚未完全恢复珊瑚礁蓬勃发展所需的生态功能。本观点文章提供了一份路线图说明如何将控制理论应用于珊瑚礁修复，利用该框架在优化作物生长方面已被证明的有效性并将其扩展到复杂生态系统。一个名为“珊瑚礁方舟”的原位中宇宙被用作测试控制干预措施和完善方法的平台。利用“珊瑚礁方舟”进行的四项实地实验展示了如何使用控制干预措施来改变生态和环境条件，并引导珊瑚礁状态因素朝着期望目标发展。这些测试结果确定了控制干预措施和参数关系，这些关系被整合到预测模型中，以确定在自然珊瑚礁上进行干预的规模。通过利用实时生态反馈，这个基于控制的框架提供了一条途径，以识别超越静态保护方法的精确、适应性干预措施，提供一种动态方法来在持续的环境变化面前维持和增强珊瑚礁功能。
