Corals in the Miocene reef in the Dominican Republic have been dissolved away, leaving a mold of the original skeleton.

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Corals in the Miocene reef in the Dominican Republic have been dissolved away, leaving a mold of the original skeleton.

Such reefs are not suitable for paleoclimate studies, but geologists can still identify the corals at the species level and study the community structure.

This image is linked to the following Scitable pages:

Coral Reefs: Canaries of the Sea, Rainforests of the Oceans

Coral reefs are very much the rainforests of the oceans. Not only are they diverse communities, but the coral skeletons - like trees - contain potentially long term records of climate.