Orbicella annularis, commonly known as the Boulder star coral, is a species of coral that lives in the western Atlantic Ocean and is the most thoroughly studied and most abundant species of reef-building coral in the Caribbean to date.Dawson, J. P. 2006. "Quantifying the colony shape of the Montastraea annularis species complex." Coral Reefs. Vol. 25:383–389. It also has a comprehensive fossil record within the Caribbean.Budd, A. F.; Stemann, T. A.; Johnson, K. G. 1994. "Stratigraphic distributions of Neogene to recent Caribbean coral reefs." J Paleontol. Vol. 68:951–977.Budd, A. F.; Klaus, J. S. The origin and early evolution of the Montastraea 'annularis' species complex (Anthozoa: Scleractinia)." J Paleontol. Vol. 75:527–545. This species complex has long been considered a generalist that exists at depths between Connell, J. H. 1978. "Diversity in tropical rain forests and coral reefs." Science. Vol. 199:1302–1310. and grows into varying colony shapes (heads, columns, plates) in response to differing light conditions.Graus, R. R.; Macintyre, I. G. 1976. "Control of form in colonial corals: computer simulation." Science. Vol. 193:895–897. Only recently with the help of molecular techniques has O. annularis been shown to be a complex of at least three separate species.Knowlton, N.; Weil, E.; Weigt, L. A.; Guzman, G. M. 1992. "Sibling species of Montastraea annularis, coral bleaching, and the coral climate record." Science. Vol. 255:330–333.Weil, E.; Knowlton, N. 1994. "A multi-character analysis of the Caribbean coral Montastraea annularis (Ellis and Solander 1786) and its two sibling species, M. faveolata (Ellis and Solander 1786) and M. franksi (Gregory 1895)." Bulletin of Marine Science. Vol. 55:151–175.Knowlton, N.; Budd, A. F. 2001. "Recognizing coral species present and past. In: Jackson JBC, Lidgard, S.; McKinney, F. K. (eds) "Evolutionary Patterns: growth, form, and tempo in the fossil record" Those species are divided into O. annularis, O. faveolata, and O. franksi. This coral was originally described as Montastraea annularis.
References
Further reading Lopez, J.V., Kersanach, R., Rehner, S.A., Knowlton, N. (1999) Molecular determination of species boundaries in corals: Genetic analysis of the Montastraea annularis complex using amplified fragment length polymorphisms and a microsatellite marker. Biol. Bull. 196:80–93. Fukami H, Budd AF, Levitan DR, Jara J, Kersanach R, Knowlton N. (2004) Geographic differences in species boundaries among members of the Montastraea annularis complex based on molecular and morphological markers. Evolution. 2004 Feb;58(2):324-37.
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