Millennium Atoll , the eastmost island of the Pacific commonwealth Kiribati , is a uncommon pristine instance of the coral reef ecosystem . Isolated from human disruption for century , the atoll is full of life as it would be without human being .
A squad of ten research worker from a variety of American institutions conducted the first scientific view of the island ’s central lagune in April 2009 . They found that the lagoon ’s pristine condition was helped not only by its remote geographic location but also the fact it is unusually wrap from the surrounding ocean , with a large number of margin reefs helping to keep it isolated .
The researchers are confident the atoll can be used as a citation for what pristine coral reef ecosystems should bet like . Over a hundred feet deep at its center , the lagoon average deepness of about twenty - five to forty substructure . The squad find that the prevalent coral species had build on enceinte platforms of older , stony coral mintage that had originally clumped at the bottom of the lagune .
Rich in alga , the lagune does n’t have the same species variety of the surrounding sea but makes up for it in the type of Pisces that call it home . The squad suppose the laguna is a crucial greenhouse expanse for the blacktip reef shark and thehumphead wrasse , both of which are under heavy threat elsewhere but were abundant at Millennium Atoll . The lagoon is also home to a huge population of jumbo clams .
Also known as Caroline Island , the island was renamed in 1999 in anticipation of the unexampled millennium . This name alteration was in credit of the fact that , due to a time geographical zone realignment in 1995 that had pushed the International Date Line to the eastward of Kiribati , Millennium Island would be the first non - south-polar land to see the morning of the millennium .
Despite this moment of global notoriety , the island ’s chronicle has remained large devoid of human contact . Only a fistful of citizenry have inhabited the atoll at various points over the last few hundred year , and the rare visits that do come are almost always confine to coconut harvest or guano minelaying . This is a crowing reason why the island has remain as pristine as it has . Unfortunately , climate change represents a huge threat to the continued universe of Millennium Island : only six foot above sea level , the government of Kiribati forecast rising ocean degree could tame the atoll in just fifteen years .
In the mean time , the scientists say that it ’s imperative the ecosystem remain undisturbed to conserve not just its position as a pristine example of a coral atoll but also the animal and plant species that call it home . Of course , I do n’t bribe this for a second . If I bed my sixties British skill fiction marionette appearance ( and , boy , do I ever ! ) , remote islands in the Pacific previously untouched by humanity can imply only one thing : invaders from the deep !
( There ’s also a slight chance that the atoll could be the base of operations for a ludicrously loaded family and theirsecret , domain - spanning rescue brass , but most leading experts sack this as crazy talk . )
[ PLoS ONE ]
BiologyCoral reefsMarine biologyScience
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