As ocean temperatures rise, coral reefs worldwide are experiencing bleaching. But what exactly is a coral reef, and why should we care what happens to them?
Why We Should Still Be Worried about Coral Reefs

As ocean temperatures rise, coral reefs worldwide are experiencing bleaching. But what exactly is a coral reef, and why should we care what happens to them?
For Valentine's Day, we're looking at how we metabolize sugars. What happens when you eat that Sweetheart or that piece of chocolate your loved one gave you? What's the deal with aspartame and high fructose corn syrup? Are there other types of sugars too?
For the twelfth day of "The STEM Chicksmas" we're highlighting the determination of the structure of ribosome by 2009 Nobel Laureates in Chemistry Venkataraman Ramakrishnan, Thomas A. Steitz, and Ada Yonath.
For the 11th day of "The STEM Chicksmas" we're highlighting the discovery of telomerase and the functions of telomeres by 2009 Nobel Laureates in Medicine Elizabeth H. Blackburn, Carol W. Greider, and Jack W. Szostak.
For the tenth day of "The STEM Chicksmas" we're highlighting the development of a technique for producing graphene, two dimensional layers of carbon, by Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov, 2010 Physics Laureates.
For the ninth day of "The STEM Chicksmas" we're looking at the discovery of conductive plastics by 2000 Nobel Laureates in Chemistry Alan J. Heeger, Alan G. MacDiarmid and Hideki Shirakawa.
For the eighth day of "The STEM Chicksmas" we're looking at the contributions to our understanding of the nervous system by 2000 Nobel Laureates in Medicine Arvid Carlsson, Paul Greengard, and Eric Kandel.
For the seventh day of "The STEM Chicksmas" we're looking at this year's Nobel Prize in Physics, won by Takaaki Kajita and Arthur B. McDonald. They discovered that neutrinos oscillate and have mass.
On Day Six of the 12 Days of "The STEM Chicksmas," we're looking at the discovery and theory of the Higgs Boson (The God, or Goddamn Particle) by 2013 Physics Nobel Laureates Peter Higgs and François Englert.
On Day Five of the 12 Days of "The STEM Chicksmas," we're looking at the discovery of quasicrystals, which changed the way we think about solid materials, by 2011 Chemistry Nobel Laureate Dan Shechtman.