Study of coral-macroalgal interactions in Singapore

The aim of the study is to study how coral-macroalgal interactions affect corals found in urbanized coastal systems in Singapore. This is done through the use of various Next-Generation-Sequencing (NGS) methods to characterize changes within the bacterial community(16S rRNA amplicon sequencing), Symbiodinium consortium (ITS2 profiling) and gene expression of the coral host (RNA sequencing). Through this study, we hope to better understand how changes in the various parts of the coral holobiont could contribute to resilience of coral reef systems in urbanized coastal areas.