It looked like a little underwater rave.
Neon pink, vibrant yellow, and bold blue coral formations lit up the ocean floor off Ko Tao Island, Thailand. For Jennifer Matthews, fresh from an undergraduate degree in biology, the experience was love at first dive.
“When I surfaced, the dive instructor explained that those colours were stress pigments.”
“The corals were stressed,” she says. “I thought, if something can look as beautiful as that while under stress, imagine how incredible they could look when healthy.”
That underwater moment spawned Jennifer’s lifelong passion for coral biology. Today, a key element of her work is steered towards an overlooked but vital part of coral survival: their nutrition.
“Just like us, corals need the right nutrients to thrive — especially under stress, or when they are subjected to changing environmental conditions.”
During her PhD, she studied coral nutrition at microscopic scales: what sugars, fats, and nutrient levels corals need and under what conditions. Her research spans the Great Barrier Reef and further south into NSW, where warming waters are shifting coral habitats southward.
A BREAKTHROUGH PROJECT? CORAL BABY FOOD.
With support from Pure Ocean, Dr Jennifer Matthews and her team are uncovering the vital nutrients coral larvae need to survive. Taking their discovery from lab to ocean, they developed a ‘coral baby food’ to boost larval health and survival directly on the Great Barrier Reef, bringing new life to damaged, high-value reefs. In partnership with GBR Biology, Reef Magic, and Traditional Owners from the Yirrganydji and Gunggandji communities, this work is helping restore coral ecosystems where they’re needed most.
Jennifer believes the study of coral nutrition represents a powerful new realm of intervention – one that could be key to securing a future for coral reefs in a changing climate.
“Nutritional supplements have been used in agriculture for decades, so why not corals?” Jennifer asks. “My research opens the door to delivering targeted coral ‘medicines’ – like probiotics or nutrients – using nanoparticles.”
“If we want to buy time for corals, bold interventions, and bold risks, are our best hope.”