Fluorescence color diversity of great barrier reef corals

A group of variously colored proteins belonging to the green fAuorescent protein(GFP)family are responsible for coloring coral tissues.Corals of the Great Barrier Reef were studied with the custom-built fiber laser fluorescence spectrometers.Spectral analysis showed that most of the excarmined corals contained multiple fuorescent peaks ranging from 470 to 620nm.This obser-vation was attributed to the presence of multiple genes of GFP-like proteins in a single coral,as well as by the photo-induced post-translational modifcations of certain GFP-like proteins.We isolated a novel photo-convertible fuorescent protein(FP)from one of the tested corals.We:propose that two processes may explain the observed diversity of the fuorescent spectra in corals:(1)dark post-translational modifcation(maturation),and(2)color photo-conversion of certain maturated proteins in response to sunlight.