Geological studies of coral reefs conducted by USGS researchers

The culmination of geological studies of coral reefs conducted by USGS researchers from the 1960s to present.

A) USGS researchers coring Grecian Rocks reef (Key Largo, FL) in the late 1970s.

B) Photograph of USGS Research Oceanographer Lauren Toth working with a student to collect a reef core from Western Sambo Reef (Key West, FL). Photo credit: Anastasios Stathakopoulos.

C) Map of core locations throughout the six sub-regions of the Florida Keys reef tract, which extends from Biscayne National Park to Dry Tortugas National Park. Colors distinguish locations of new cores collected for this study (orange, 14 cores) from locations of previous, “legacy” coring studies (yellow, 44 cores).

D) Photograph of a reef core from Dry Tortugas National Park collected in 2017. Labels indicate the depth of core penetration into the reef in feet.