Kristen Marhaver, Ph.D.

Advancing assisted reproductive technologies could help endangered corals

Rising global temperatures, disease outbreaks, and human activities such as coastal development, pollution, and overfishing threaten coral reefs worldwide. These stressors increase coral mortality, decrease reproductive success, and restrict genetic diversity as coral populations decline. Assisted breeding can help preserve and rebuild genetic diversity in corals, buying time for endangered populations to adapt to changing environments. But this process is currently not feasible at a large scale, particularly when corals are rare or stressed. 

Kristen Marhaver will work to increase success rates in human-assisted coral breeding—providing a new lifeline to embattled coral species. Focusing on corals in Curaçao in the southern Caribbean, she will develop and test new techniques for fertilizing coral eggs in the laboratory using a suite of assisted reproductive technologies from wildlife conservation and human reproduction. If successful, this work will help science and restoration teams use coral gene banks to scale up breeding of endangered corals. Dr. Marhaver will share her findings through a public webinar and engagement with a global working group of reef restoration practitioners. She will also continue working with local conservation organizations in Curaçao, building a community of divers, students, and researchers with coral breeding and restoration expertise.

To learn more about Dr. Marhaver, read her bio.

See the full list of 2025 Pew marine fellows.