Corals in Andamans

The noun 'Corals' is believed to have derived its to origin from an Arabic word 'garal' which means small stone, or Hebrew 'goral' which means pebble. Later the Greek adopted it as 'korallion' and in Latin it appeared as 'Coralium'. The present day English version means 'the hard stony skeleton secreted by certain marine polyps'. The animals, which secretes and builds this skeleton originated some 570 million years ago. This tiny boneless, fragile creature is genetically endowed with exceptionally high architectural skill polyps create multispectral & multidimensional skeletons known as corals. A close look at a dead bleached coral piece will reveal its porousness. Millions of pores are found in a small piece of coral. Each 'pore' was the home for a 'polyp' and each piece of this calcareous 'garal' is the outcome of cumulative effort put-in by billions of polyps for a long time.

Credit: Naval Marine Museum, Samudrika.