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Foundation grant funding supported the development of diagnostic tools for studying “White Band and Yellow Band” diseases, and determining whether “Dark Spot” is of bacterial or fungal origin.

Grant Recipient: Caribbean Coral Disease and Health Consortium (CDHC) (administered through the University of South Carolina, USA)

Principal Investigator: Dr. Gariett Smith

Co-Principal Investigator: Dr. Cheryl Woodley

Grant money was applied to determining a definitive “etiologic agent” (cause of a disease: the set of factors that contributes to the occurrence of a disease) for “White Band and Yellow Band” diseases and to determine whether “Dark Spot” is of bacterial or fungal origin.

The outcome of our grant money was the expectation of development of diagnostic tools that could be used by the entire research community for each of these coral diseases.

The Foundation grant money was applied to travel and field logistics for field experiments, supplies, and analytical services (including DNA sequencing).

The discovery of the causes of these critical coral diseases has been partially attributed to the philanthropy of HRH Prince Khaled bin Sultan and the work of the Living Oceans Foundation.