James Cook University professor Philip Munday takes notes while surveying fish species on a stretch of healthy coral reef near Normanby Island, Papua New Guinea. Scientists have been studying coral communities near underground carbon-dioxide vents and comparing the marine life to that found on healthy reefs with normal water chemistry, including this one.
A biologist photographs coral near Dobu Island, Papua New Guinea, which is home to some of the healthiest, most diverse tropical reefs in the world.
German biologist Anna Kluibenschedl swims alongside an unusually large cabbage coral near Dobu Island, Papua New Guinea.
A biologist looks for signs of marine life in the crevices of a giant coral near Dobu Island, Papua New Guinea.
Lemon damsels and blue-green chromis flit about near branching corals off Normanby Island, Papua New Guinea.
A brain coral near Dobu Island, in Papua New Guinea.
A tube-building Christmas tree worm sprouts from a massive boulder coral.
Biologists Philip Munday, Jodie Rummer and Alistair Cheal try to catch damselfish near underwater carbon-dioxide vents off Normanby Island, Papua New Guinea. The researchers wanted to test the physiology and behavior of the fish and compare them with fish caught from reefs in normal water a few hundred yards away.
Fish circle and swim among the healthy coral reefs off Normanby Island, Papua New Guinea.
Australian reef ecologist Katharina Fabricius inspects a ceramic tile installed a year earlier near CO2 vents off Normanby Island, Papua New Guinea, to see what types of marine life had taken root. Amid the more corrosive water near the vents, algae, sea grasses and slime were taking over, driving out new coral colonies.
A leather coral grows near Normanby Island, Papua New Guinea.
Biologist Miwa Takahashi gets shuttled back to a dive boat after collecting water samples and studying sea grass near the underwater carbon-dioxide vents off Normanby Island, Papua New Guinea.
Katharina Fabricius photographs ceramic tiles, placed near carbon-dioxide vents off Normanby Island, that collect plant and animal larvae from the water column. These plates are used to document what types of new life are taking root and growing in the chemically altered water.
At dusk on the upper deck of the M/V Chertan, biologist Anna Kluibenschedl, at microscope, documents marine life growing on a tile removed from the reef off Normanby Island.
Biologist Jodie Rummer dissects a fish she caught at one of the carbon-dioxide vent sites off Papua New Guinea as part of her effort to understand how or if chemically altered water affects fish.
Lemon damsels hover above branching corals on a healthy reef off Normanby Island, Papua New Guinea.
Biologist Jodie Rummer monitors readings on her laptop aboard the M/V Chertan, anchored off Normanby Island, Papua New Guinea. In a tub at her feet, fish caught near the carbon-dioxide vents are racing around. Rummer uses the computer to measure their metabolic capacity, which she will compare with fish netted from healthy waters.
Biologists Anna Kluibenschedl, left, Miwa Takahashi and Joy Smith prepare their dive gear for a trip to the underwater carbon-dioxide vents just off Normanby Island, Papua New Guinea.
Islanders are ferried just after dawn to the village of Esa’Ala on Normanby Island, Papua New Guinea. The people who live on these remote islands get almost all of their animal protein from the sea.
Biologists Sam Noonan, left, and Miwa Takahashi collect sea grass in Papua New Guinea. Sea grasses, which are expected to increase as the ocean becomes more acidic, grow far faster near the CO2 vents.
A child from Dobu Island, Papua New Guinea, smiles up at scientists working aboard a dive boat anchored just offshore. Many children here are skilled at paddling dugout canoes by the time they reach age 3.
Villagers from Normanby Island look on as scientists don diving gear to survey underwater carbon-dioxide vents.
Coral reef ecologist Katharina Fabricius greets Patricia Chris, matriarch of a family that controls access to coral reefs off Normanby Island, Papua New Guinea, where carbon-dioxide bubbles escape through cracks in the seafloor. Every year, Fabricius visits the family and asks permission to study marine life around the vent sites.
Augustine Mungkaje, a fisheries professor at the University of Papua New Guinea, helps Australian reef ecologist Katharina Fabricius explain to residents of Esa’Ala, on Normanby Island, why scientists are studying the carbon-dioxide vents just off shore.
Normanby Island resident Gingsley Sovek asks a question of scientists who are explaining to his village why they are studying the CO2 vents near his home.
Children help biologist Joy Smith cart plastic tubs of coral and sediment through the jungle on Normanby Island, Papua New Guinea. She is studying whether CO2 might harm tiny animals at the bottom of the marine food chain.
The teeth of villagers in this part of Papua New Guinea are often stained red from chewing betel nut, a mild stimulant.
David Sabeya builds a canoe near his home on Dobu Island, Papua New Guinea. Sabeya says villagers don’t typically spend much time in or around the carbon-dioxide bubble sites because fewer of the fish and marine creatures they like to eat live there.
Villagers on Normanby Island say goodbye to scientists who came ashore by skiff to explain what they hope to understand about the carbon-dioxide vents just offshore.
A young boy visits the M/V Chertan as it sits anchored off Normanby Island, Papua New Guinea. Villagers paddled the quarter mile out to the dive boat several times each day to sell fresh pineapple or watch scientists prepare their dive gear.
Fishermen gather at sunset in the South Pacific, off Normanby Island. Nearly 1 billion people around the world get the bulk of their animal protein from fish.
Ridley Guma and Edwin Morioga dive at night using spears and flashlights to catch reef fish off Normanby Island, Papua New Guinea.
After spearing small fusilier fish and rabbit fish, Ridley Guma and Edwin Morioga toss the catch aboard a tiny dugout canoe, which trails behind as they swim and scan the reef for their prey.
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