While corals play an important role in increasing biodiversity by providing complex habitat structures for other species, they are highly threatened due to various factors (ex. climate change and over-fishing). We examined spatial genetic structure of two types of corals (precious corals and reef-building corals) aiming for their conservation.
First, we applied a genome-wide SNP analysis called MIG-seq to reveal spatial genetic structure and species boundaries in precious corals that can be found at depths of 100 to 300 m in Japan. Secondly, we examined 3 dimensional genetic structure of reef-building coral, Seriatopora hystrix that inhabits up to 50 m depth in Ryukyu Islands.