A new shaggy species of coral discovered off of Molokai has a name from a galaxy far, far away, courtesy of the University of Hawai‘i researcher who found it.
A study published this month gives official Latin species and genus names to several deep-sea species found in the Pacific, including one found in waters near Hawai‘i: the Iridogorgia chewbacca.
UH professor emeritus Les Watling, who first discovered the species in 2006, told Aloha State Daily that he had wanted to name the coral after the furry Star Wars character since he first saw it. Nineteen years and five Star Wars movies later, he has.
“It’s got that Wookiee look,” Watling said. “This one just had all the attributes of Chewbacca.”
The coral’s distinct, shaggy, flexible branches that give it is name are unique to the Iridogorgia genus, which otherwise feature rigid branches. Watling speculated that the flexibility comes from a lack of calcium carbonate, the compound that forms the “bones” of coral reef structures.
Had he not been able to name the coral after Chewbacca, Watling said he would have chosen a Latin word reflecting the coral’s flexibility. Fortunately, he said, collaborating scientists in China had no problem with the name.
“They told me Chewbacca isn’t very well-known in China,” Watling said, adding that one of his Chinese colleagues had himself named a coral species about a Chinese cultural figure that wasn’t well-known in America.
The Molokai specimen is one of only two collected in the world. Watling said his sample of the Chewbacca coral — along with several other specimens during a dive — was found in 2006, while Chinese researchers found a second specimen near the Mariana Trench in 2016.
Before the collaboration with Chinese scientists, Watling said his Chewbacca specimen — about 20 centimeters of the more than four-foot-tall coral — had been sitting in storage for years. Watling said he “always meant to get around” a proper analysis, but other subjects had taken priority.
Watling said the species seems to prefer “the upper part of the deep sea,” with the Molokai specimen found about 600 meters deep.
Other than the two specimens already collected, Watling said he had caught a glimpse of a third — in a picture published in a Japanese book on deep-sea species.
“There’s probably not a lot more of them,” Watling said.
Watling said the discovery of two specimens of the same coral species located so far away from each other — the Mariana Trench is, very roughly, 4,000 miles away from Molokai — illustrates the sheer size of the Indo-Pacific biogeographic region.
The coral’s preferred habitat places it out of harm’s way of incidental fishing damage, Watling said, meaning that the greatest threat facing the species is rising sea temperatures.
But, like Chewbacca, the coral could prove resilient. Watling said that, located as deep as it is, the shaggy new species could see fewer ill effects from a 2-degree rise in water temperature than others found closer to the surface.
