WATCH: Microscopic Video of Corals Kissing, Growing and Fighting

Although coral reefs may appear to be colorful marine gardens, they are actually animals. Now, thanks to a new high-tech microscope, we get to see how these creatures live and interact with each other.

The study was published in Nature Communications, done by researchers from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California at San Diego.

It shows off the stunning results of their latest foray into underwater microscopy: Polyps "kiss." Single-celled algae jump ships as the water warms -- coral bleaching.

A Benthic Underwater Microscope (BUM) was used to view these little creatures, though this high-tech microscope won't replace work done in labs. It can only capture high-resolution images of objects about a tenth of the width of a human hair, and more traditional microscopy can do a lot better than that. But lab microscopes are built for slicing and staining samples to examine, while the BUM allows researchers to record real-world behavior in a smaller scale.

Normally, coral reefs can be difficult to observe since they are not as active as animals because individual polyps are too small to be seen. And with the use of the microscope -- which can either be held by a human diver or placed underwater for several hours of time-lapse filming -- has already recorded a behavior no one has ever seen before.

In one of the coral colonies they filmed overnight, neighboring polyps took turns embracing or "kissing" one another.

They also filmed two different coral species sitting close to each other in the Red Sea which turned out to be actually competing with each other.

The BUM was also used to investigate the process of coral bleaching. The researchers deployed BUM off the coast of Maui where one of the largest coral-bleaching event was recorded. There they observed corals that were bleached but not yet dead. They also found algae was growing in a honeycomb patter between weekend polyps, "colonizing" the coral before it was dead by weaving around its living tissue.

"This instrument is a part of a new trend in ocean research to bring the lab to the ocean, instead of bringing the ocean to the lab," study co-lead Tali Treibitz, a former Scripps postdoctoral researcher now at the University of Haifa, said in a statement.

Source: The Washington Post

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