In this Sept. 28, 2015, photo, Hawaii Institute of Marine Biology director Ruth Gates shows corals that are undergoing enhancement at her lab on Coconut Island near Kaneohe, Hawaii.Caleb Jones/AP
Pioneering coral reef scientist Ruth Gates, who dedicated much of her career to saving the world’s fragile and deteriorating underwater reef ecosystems, has died. She was 56.
Ms. Gates died in Honolulu on Oct. 25, the University of Hawaii said Tuesday. The researcher, also the president of the International Society for Reef Studies, was diagnosed with brain cancer in May and had been on medical leave since.
Ms. Gates became known globally for her idea to speed up coral evolution and create more resilient reefs.
The Associated Press first wrote about her project to breed “super coral ” in 2015. Her goal was to develop coral that could withstand the devastating effects of climate change. Her work was featured in the 2017 Netflix documentary Chasing Coral.
Warmer ocean temperatures can cause corals to go through a process known as bleaching, in which the animals become weak and sick. Repeated bleaching events can lead to coral death and the loss of entire reef ecosystems.
Ms. Gates’s colleague and partner in the assisted evolution project, professor Madeleine van Oppen of the Australian Institute of Marine Science, said Ms. Gates was “a great inspiration” to many.
“She was a great ambassador for the reef and a role model for women in coral reef science,” Ms. Van Oppen said in an e-mail.
Ms. Van Oppen said it’s a shame she will not be able to see the long-term impacts of their research. “But I will work extra hard to try and make it a success in her honour,” she said.
Mark Eakin, co-ordinator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Coral Reef Watch program, said Ms. Gates’s death is a loss for the entire scientific community.
“Ruth was really a force of nature, I mean she was just an amazingly productive scientist, one of the brightest, most inquisitive minds that we had in the whole field of coral reef science. Her energy was boundless,” Mr. Eakin said in a phone interview.
Ms. Gates faced a “whole suite of criticisms” over her plan to breed stronger corals, but “rather than dismissing those criticisms, she would embrace them,” Mr. Eakin said. “She is the kind of great leader who has trained so many and left a legacy of students who will be able to pick up and continue this work.”
Ms. Gates’s research won the support of philanthropist and Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, allowing her to expand, develop and test her theories in a lab on Oahu’s Coconut Island.
“Ruth Gates realized before most others that for corals to survive climate change, their adaptation to warming waters will have to be assisted,” said Lauren Kickham, director of product management at Paul G. Allen Philanthropies. “She believed in their resilience and ultimately offered hope for the future.” Mr. Allen, 65, died Oct. 15 from complications of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.
Ms. Gates was born in Akrotiri, Cyprus, in 1962 and leaves her wife, Robin Burton-Gates, and her brother, Tim Gates.