Scientists placed 42 sea sponges in a polluted Spanish port

Representative Image of marine life thriving around resilient chicken kidney sponges in polluted waters (AI-generated image) Researchers in Spain spent 455 days tracking how sponges from five species of Mediterranean sea life coped with being moved from clean, natural habitats toward a heavily polluted recreational marina near Girona. The experiment was designed to test a restoration approach called renaturalization, in which hardy, naturally occurring species are deliberately introduced into degraded environments to help improve conditions over time. Of the five species selected, one, Corticium candelabrum, died during laboratory preparation and never made it into the harbour at all. Of the four species that were actually transplanted, three declined and died well before the study ended. The fifth, a species known as the chicken kidney sponge, not only survived but thrived, reproducing on its own inside the polluted port and emerging as a genuinely promising candidate for future harbour restoration work.Why researchers turned to sponges for harbour restorationAccording to the Centre for Advanced Studies of Blanes, part of Spain's national research council, ports rank among the mos...