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Our Technology
We mass produce premade stone coral skeletons, significantly reducing the number of years of coral calcification (skeletal growth) required to reach adult size.
The automated manufacturing technology we use, can be deployed close to the restoration site for onsite manufacturing, using locally sourced natural aggregate mixes. The system allows for the cheap and fast production of 10,000 skeletons per day, each with the capacity to hold 6-8 coral fragments. We reduce our carbon footprint by using recycled stone waste from the construction industry and greatly reducing transportation emissions by enabling local manufacturing of the products close to the restoration site.
The premade skeletons are then seeded with fragments of coral. The coral propagation process is a repetitive task that is currently manual.
As with mass production of any product, large-scale processing of coral at the millions to tens of millions per year range, requires the automation of any repetitive manual tasks. Our system automates coral propagation using robotics and artificial intelligence. These automated systems are designed for onsite deployment at the restoration site. They are also designed to work collaboratively with people, freeing up humans to do more complex work.
We have developed several supporting products for transportation and deployment of corals.
With large-scale coral reef restoration becoming a necessity, we are in a unique position to develop an efficient and sustainable supply chain from the ground up. This will require not only new technology, but also a cost effective, easy to implement, and carbon neutral logistics, including packing, transportation and deployment systems. Our products are designed to operate within existing logistics infrastructure, with the potential to be massively upscaled.
FOUNDER
Taryn is a coral biologist with 10 years of experience in researching the impacts of climate change on coral reefs.
Her research on coral reefs at the University of Western Australia and Australian Institute of Marine Science, ranged from coral bleaching and ocean acidification to coral spawning and growth rates. She is a Fulbright Fellow, Research Associate at the California Academy of Sciences and a Resident at the Autodesk Technology Center. Prior to her research career, Taryn worked in her family’s business in the manufacturing industry. Taryn is passionate about cross-industry innovation. Combining her manufacturing background with her expertise in coral biology, she offers a unique perspective to upscaling coral reef restoration.
MANUFACTURING ENGINEER
Rob is a Mechanical Engineer specialising in Additive Manufacturing (3D printing).
His work has ranged from 3D printing titanium parts for the aeronautical industry, to building mobile manufacturing units for onsite manufacturing of parts. He is particularly interested in sustainability in the manufacturing industry, through the whole life cycle of a product. Rob has spearheaded rapid prototyping of Coral Maker’s manufacturing designs.
DESIGN ENGINEER
Tom is an Automotive Engineer specialising in CAD (Computer Aided Design) and CAM (Computer Aided Manufacturing).
He is an expert in Autodesk’s Fusion 360 software and in manufacturing parts using CNC machines. Tom creates the 3D models of Coral Maker’s designs. He also manufactures several of the designs using CNC machining and prepares them for factory testing. Tom took up scuba diving in 2018 and the following year joined Coral Maker to make a positive impact on the world’s coral reefs.
ROBOTIC PERCEPTION
Nic’s academic background includes Bachelor’s degrees in Mathematics and Mechatronic Engineering from the University of Adelaide.
She has a PhD in Ecology, Evolution and Systematics from the Australian National University and a post-doctorate in bio-robotics at Harvard University. She has a particular interest in bio-inspired robotic systems, which has taken her from filming dragonflies in the Australian outback, to studying honeybees in northern Germany, to investigating termite mounds in northern Namibia. As a control engineer and perception specialist, her work with Coral Maker is focussed on ensuring effective and seamless control of the coral seeding automation processes.
ROBOTICS AND AI
Yotto’s PhD, from the School of Engineering at Stanford University, is in robotics and reasoning for manipulation tasks.
He is a member of Autodesk’s AI Lab and specialises in applying deep learning techniques to robotic tasks and perception in the manufacturing industry. He has previously co-founded two startups, Haiku Media and Motion Factory, specializing in digital actor, autonomous behaviours, and 3D game middleware technology. Yotto joined Coral Maker in 2020, and is working on using robotics and AI to automate steps in the coral propagation process, with scaling considerations.
ROBOTIC SYSTEMS
Heather’s background is in Mechanical Engineering and Product Design (Stanford University).
Her recent work has focused on connecting design tools to robotic fabrication workflows, and she is particularly interested in making robots more accessible to a wider community of engineers, designers, fabricators and scientists. At Coral Maker, Heather develops workflows to connect Coral Maker CAD models to the robotic system so that the automation can be more flexible and easier to implement.
Shubham Goel
Dr. Rebecca Albright
Tom Rutteman
Chris Luk
OUR FUTURE
Coral Maker envisions a world with a stable climate and thriving ecosystems, benefitting human wellbeing as well as the millions of other species we share the planet with.
While we may not see the entirety of this vision become a reality in our lifetimes, it is vital that we set the stage for the generations that come after us.
RESTORATION ECONOMY
Growing the ecosystem restoration economy will be a critical step in paving the way for this future. A future where rewilding our precious natural habitats is both commonplace and expected.
We believe that to save coral reefs, we need to use every tool available to us, as well as develop new tools and technology. Our hope is for our technology to help accelerate the growth of the marine restoration industry by enabling large-scale, impactful coral reef restoration.
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