Cnidarian · cold-water reef-building coral

Deep-reef white coral

Desmophyllum pertusum (formerly Lophelia pertusa)

PacificAtlanticIndianSouthernArctic Found in 3 oceans

Depth

Mostly 200 to 1,000 m, from 39 m to more than 3,300 m

Size

Polyps about 1 cm, colonies 5 to 10 m, reefs up to 40 km long

Diet

Plankton and particles brought by currents

Zone

The sea floor · 200 – 3,500 m

Key facts

• It lives without algae or sunlight. It catches its food with its tentacles in the cold currents.
• It grows from a few millimeters to about 1 cm a year. The reefs of Norway are about 8,000 years old.
• The largest known reef, off Norway, is about 40 km long.
• More than 1,300 species have been found on these reefs in the Northeast Atlantic.

Verified sources

1. NINA Report 1028 : Lophelia pertusa in Norwegian waters
2. Büscher et al. 2019, PeerJ : In situ growth of Lophelia pertusa
3. Oceana Canada : Lophelia coral
4. MarLIN : A cold water coral (Lophelia pertusa)
5. Addamo et al. 2016 : Merging scleractinian genera Desmophyllum and Lophelia

In the game: To observe

In the same zone

Azores vent musselBathymodiolus azoricus MonkfishLophius piscatorius Bird’s nest spongePheronema carpenteri Pink abyssal sea cucumberAmperima rosea Scaly-foot gastropodChrysomallon squamiferum Indian Ocean vent shrimpRimicaris kairei