Since 2020, the Allen Coral Atlas has been managed and operated by Arizona State University’s Center for Global Discovery and Conservation Science.

Current Funders

Anthropocene Institute

Anthropocene Institute comprises scientists, engineers, communicators, marketers, thought leaders, and advocates — all pulling together toward a common goal: make Earth abundant and sustainable for all generations to come.

Global Conservation

Poaching, logging, mining, land clearing, and human encroachment are accelerating. As wild spaces become scarcer, it becomes increasingly important to protect what we have left. Global Conservation trains, equips, and empowers rangers globally to advance their protection of wild spaces on land and in the sea.

Developers

Arizona State University’s Center for Global Discovery and Conservation Science, Planet, Coral Reef Alliance, University of Queensland, and Vulcan Inc. developed the Allen Coral Atlas.

Arizona State University

As lead of the Allen Coral Atlas partnership, the Global Discovery and Conservation Science team is responsible for strategy and future innovation, web engineering, and data management, as well as technical innovations such as calculating ocean depth and benthic reflectance, and building the first-of-its-kind coral reef monitoring and alert system capable of detecting changes such as hot-water bleaching and destruction caused by coastal development.

Coral Reef Alliance

The Coral Reef Alliance (CORAL) is focused on saving the world’s coral reefs. Their worldwide team works at local, regional, and global levels to keep coral reefs healthy, so they can survive for generations to come.

Planet

Planet is an integrated aerospace and data analytics company that operates history's largest commercial fleet of satellites, collecting a massive amount of information about our changing planet. Planet's data and machine learning-powered analytics are used by customers to develop new technologies, drive revenue, power research, and solve our world’s toughest challenges.

University of Queensland

As a part of the Allen Coral Atlas project, Dr. Chris Roelfsema and Prof. Stuart Phinn led their team in two main components: 1) acquiring new and existing verification data and 2) creating benthic and geomorphic maps of the world’s coral reefs. These maps are crucial to conservationists in identifying the reef composition and will be used for planning and managing marine protected areas.

Vulcan

Having helped change the way the world communicates when he co-founded Microsoft more than 40 years ago, Paul G. Allen worked to apply cutting-edge technology to change the trajectory of today’s toughest problems. Vulcan is applying its resources and expertise in technology, aerospace, biodiversity, and maritime security to fill key information gaps and support the development of sustainable solutions.

Past and Current Collaborators

Coral Reef Watch

To enhance coral reef resilience in a warming world, NOAA established the Coral Reef Watch (CRW) program in 2000. For more than 20 years, NOAA CRW has utilized remote sensing, modeled and in situ data to observe, predict, and report to its users on the coral reef environment worldwide. CRW provides the only global early-warning system of coral reef ecosystem physical environmental changes

Great Barrier Reef Foundation

The Great Barrier Reef Foundation exists to ensure a Great Barrier Reef for future generations. We seek out the solutions and innovations that will also benefit coral reefs globally as they tackle the same threats and challenges facing the world's largest Reef.

Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation

The Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation (KSLOF) is a nonprofit environmental organization that provides science-based solutions to protect and restore ocean health. As part of its commitment to Science Without Borders®, KSLOF shares its findings with governments, scientists, and local communities so that they can use the latest science for sustainable ocean protection.

MERMAID

MERMAID is an open-source data platform that collects and manages real-time data on coral reef ecosystem health from >1,500 coral reef scientists in >35 countries around the world. MERMAID helps scientists collect, analyze and share critical data on coral reef health - empowering scientists, communities, and governments in linking data to conservation and policy action.

National Geographic Society

The National Geographic Society is a global nonprofit organization that uses the power of science, exploration, education and storytelling to illuminate the wonder of the world, define critical challenges, and catalyze action to protect our planet.

The Nature Conservancy

The mission of The Nature Conservancy (TNC) is to conserve the lands and waters on which all life depends. In the Caribbean, TNC is working to create healthy, resilient islands by protecting the ocean and coasts, safeguarding against the impacts of climate change and conserving and restoring coral reefs.

Wildlife Conservation Society

WCS stands for wildlife and wild places and leads conservation programs spanning the entire ocean and more than 3 million biologically critical square miles in over 50 countries. WCS runs the world’s largest conservation field program, protecting more than 50 percent of Earth’s known biodiversity; in partnership with governments, Indigenous Peoples, Local Communities, and the private sector.

World Wildlife Fund

The Coral Reef Rescue Initiative presents a rescue strategy to conserve the world’s rapidly deteriorating tropical coral reefs. The initiative will focus on protecting those reefs that have the greatest potential to survive in a warming ocean and to act as source reefs from which corals can regenerate in the future. In particular, that means supporting the handful of developing countries where most climate-resilient reefs are found, and especially the human communities on the front-line.

Founders

To help address the coral crisis, Vulcan convened Planet, Carnegie Institution for Science, University of Hawaii, and University of Queensland to build the world’s first high resolution global map and monitoring system for coral reefs.

Carnegie Science

Carnegie Institution for Science is a non-profit organization founded on Andrew Carnegie’s philosophy of devoting resources to exceptional individuals so that they can explore the most intriguing scientific questions in an atmosphere of complete freedom.

Hawai'i Institute of Marine Biology

The Hawaiʻi Institute of Marine Biology (HIMB) is an independent research unit within the School of Ocean Earth Science and Technology (SOEST) at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa. Formerly directed by renowned coral reef scientist and conservationist Ruth Gates, the Institute’s mission is to conduct multi-disciplinary research and education into all aspects of tropical marine biology.

Planet

University of Queensland

The University of Queensland (UQ) is one of Australia’s leading research and teaching institutions. They strive for excellence through the creation, preservation, transfer and application of knowledge. For more than a century, UQ has educated and worked with outstanding people to deliver knowledge leadership for a better world.

Vulcan

Past Funders

Lyda Hill

Lyda Hill Philanthropies encompasses the charitable giving for founder Lyda Hill and includes her foundation and personal philanthropy. The organization is committed to funding transformational advances in science and nature, empowering nonprofit organizations and improving the North Texas and Colorado Springs communities. Because Miss Hill has a fervent belief that “science is the answer” to many of life’s most challenging issues, she has chosen to donate the entirety of her estate to philanthropy and scientific research.

Paul M Angell. Family Foundation

The mission of the Paul M. Angell Family Foundation is to advance society through the performing arts, conservation of the world’s oceans, and alleviation of poverty. The primary focus of the Foundation’s grant making in Conservation is the protection of the world’s oceans and species. Allen Coral Atlas partners, the National Geographic Society and The Wildlife Conservation Society, received a grant from the Paul M. Angell Family Foundation to fund global field engagement efforts.