The Institute for Figuring is working on a really cool crocheted coral reef. 

The website says the reef is "a woolly celebration of the intersection of higher geometry and feminine handicraft, and a testimony to the disappearing wonders of the marine world." The primary factor leading to the death of coral reefs around the world is Global Warming.

The above picture is part of the crochet reef. Below is a photo of part of an actual coral reef! While the wool reef is beautiful, let's hope that isn't the only type of reef we have left a century from now!



The website includes a nice explanation of how global warming affects coral. The warming water, plus increased acidity (due to increased CO2 levels in the oceans), plus increased cyclone activity all impact the reefs.

The Institute For Figuring is an educational organization dedicated to enhancing the public understanding of figures and figuring techniques. From the physics of snowflakes and the hyperbolic geometry of sea slugs, to the mathematics of paper folding and graphical models of the human mind, the Institute takes as its purview a complex ecology of figuring.