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Structural and Mechanical Properties of Staghorn Coral (Acropora cervicornis) CaCO3 Aragonite Skeletons, Cleaned by Chemical Bleaching and Biological Processes
Advances in Applied Ceramics
  • Mahmoud Omer, University of Central Florida
  • Alejandro Carrasco-Pena, University of Central Florida
  • Nina Orlovskaya, University of Central Florida
  • Boyce E. Collins, North Carolina A&T University
  • Sergey N. Yarmolenko, North Carolina A&T University
  • Jagannathan Sankar, North Carolina A&T University
  • Ghatu Subhash, University of Florida
  • David S Gilliam, Nova Southeastern University
  • John E. Fauth, University of Central Florida
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
9-9-2020
Keywords
  • Mechanical properties,
  • Microstructure,
  • Porous materials,
  • CaCO3 aragonite,
  • Coral skeleton
Abstract

Coral reefs provide habitat for most oceanic life forms, however, they are declining worldwide due to pollution, increased ocean temperature, diseases and other factors. In this paper, structural and mechanical properties of endangered coral (Acropora cervicornis) skeletons cleaned by chemical bleaching and biological processes were studied. The structure of CaCO3 aragonite skeleton is porous and very complex and affects the deformation behaviour of coral skeletons. The average compressive strength was equal to 9.5 ± 2.3 MPa and 14.5 ± 6.4 MPa, while Vickers hardness was measured to be equal to 3.67 ± 0.33 GPa and 3.65 ± 0.24 GPa for the chemically bleached and biologically cleaned skeletons, respectively, thus showing similar values regardless of the cleaning techniques. The results are important for understanding the fundamental relationship between the coral skeleton’s microstructure and mechanical behaviour.

DOI
10.1080/17436753.2020.1815500
Comments

©2020 Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining. Published by Taylor & Francis on behalf of the Institute.

Additional Comments
NSF MRI award #: 133775; NSF award #: 0959511
Citation Information
Mahmoud Omer, Alejandro Carrasco-Pena, Nina Orlovskaya, Boyce E. Collins, et al.. "Structural and Mechanical Properties of Staghorn Coral (Acropora cervicornis) CaCO3 Aragonite Skeletons, Cleaned by Chemical Bleaching and Biological Processes" Advances in Applied Ceramics (2020) ISSN: 1743-6761
Available at: http://works.bepress.com/david-gilliam/123/