Ludwig, K. R., Muhs, D. R., Simmons, K. R., Halley, R. B.,
and Shinn, E. A., 1996. Sea-level records at $80 ka from tectonically stable platforms: Florida and Bermuda. Geology, 24(3),
211–214.
Muhs, D. R., 2002. Evidence for the timing and duration of the last
interglacial period from high-precision uranium-series ages of
corals on tectonically stable coastlines. Quaternary Research,
58, 36–40.
Muhs, D. R., Wehmiller, J. F., Simmons, K. R., and York, L. L.,
2003. Quaternary sea-level history of the United States. Developments in Quaternary Science, 1, 147–183.
Multer, H. G., Gischler, E., Lundberg, J., Simmons, K. R., and
Shinn, E. A., 2002. Key Largo Limestone revisited: Pleistocene shelf-edge facies, Florida Keys, USA. Facies, 46,
229–272.
Neumann, A. C., and Macintyre, I. G., 1985. Response to sea
level rise: keep-up, catch-up, or give-up. In Proceedings of
the 5th International Coral Reef Congress, Tahiti, Vol. 3,
pp. 105–110.
Porter, J. W., and Porter, K. G. (eds.), 2002. The Everglades, Florida
Bay and Coral Reefs of the Florida Keys: an Ecosystem Sourcebook. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press.
Shinn, E. A., 1963. Spur and groove formation on the Florida reef
tract. Journal of Sedimentary Petrology, 33, 291–303.
Shinn, E. A., 1980. Geologic history of Grecian Rocks, Key Largo
Coral Reef Marine Sanctuary. Bulletin of Marine Science, 30,
646–656.
Shinn, E. A., Hudson, J. H., Halley, R. B., and Lidz, B. H., 1977.
Topographic control and accumulation rate of some Holocene
coral reefs, South Florida and Dry Tortugas. In Proceedings of
the 3rd International Coral Reef Symposium, Miami, Florida.
Geology, Vol. 2, pp. 1–7.
Shinn, E. A., Reese, R. S., and Reich, C. D., 1994. Fate and Pathways of Injection-well Effluent in the Florida Keys. U.S. Geological Survey Open-File Report 94–276, 116 pp.
Shinn, E. A., Smith, G. W., Prospero, J. M., Betzer, P., Hayes, M. L.,
Garrison, V., and Barber, R. T., 2000. African dust and the
demise of Caribbean coral reefs. Geophysical Research Letters,
27(19), 3029–3032.
Toscano, M. A., 1996. Late Quaternary Stratigraphy, Sea-level History, and Paleoclimatology of the Southeast Florida Outer Continental Shelf. Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, St. Petersburg,
University of South Florida, 280 pp.
Toscano, M. A., and Lundberg, J., 1998. Early Holocene sea-level
record from submerged fossil reefs on the southeast Florida margin. Geology, 26(3), 255–258.
Toscano, M. A., and Lundberg, J., 1999. Submerged late Pleistocene reefs on the tectonically stable S.E. Florida margin: highprecision geochronology, stratigraphy, resolution of substage
5a sea-level elevation, and orbital forcing. Quaternary Science
Reviews, 18, 753–767.
Cross-references
Accommodation Space
Acropora
Airborne Dust Impacts
Back-Stepping
Calcrete/Caliche
Holocene Reefs: Thickness and Characteristics
Last Glacial Lowstand and Shelf Exposure
Ocean Acidification, Effects on Calcification
Patch Reefs: Lidar Morphometric Analysis
Porosity Variability In Limestone Sequences
Sea Level Change and Its Effect on Reef Growth
Sea-level Indicators
Spurs and Grooves
FORAM INDEX
Pamela Hallock
University of South Florida, St. Petersburg, FL, USA
Benthic representatives of the protistan class Foraminifera
have exceptional utility as bioindicators of coastal contamination because they have short life spans and specific
niches, and therefore respond quickly to environmental
change; they are commonly well preserved in the sedimentary record; they are widely distributed, yet generally
regarded as relatively immobile; they are diverse; they
are relatively small, abundant, and easily sampled; their
collection has minimal impact on environmental
resources; and the most stress-tolerant representatives are
often among the last eukaryotes to disappear completely
from heavily contaminated sites (Yanko et al., 1994;
Schafer, 2000). In reef environments, enrichment of nutrients and therefore of organic matter tends to increase abundance and diversity of small, heterotrophic taxa at the
expense of the mixotrophic larger foraminifers that host
algal endosymbionts. Hallock et al. (2003) developed the
Foraminifera in Reef Assessment and Monitoring
(FORAM) Index (FI) to provide a simple, non-invasive
indicator of whether water quality in the environment is
sufficient to support coral-reef growth or recovery. The
FI is calculated from foraminiferal-assemblage data from
surficial sediments and is based on observations that
symbiont-bearing foraminifers and zooxanthellate, reefbuilding corals require similar high water quality. The FI
is somewhat dependent on sediment texture, so sediments
dominated by coarse sands or by very fine sands or muds
do not provide meaningful data.
The FI enumerates foraminiferal taxa into functional
groups, calculated as follows:
FI ¼ ð10 Â P s Þ þ ðP o Þ þ ð2 Â P h Þ
where P s = N s /T,
P o ¼ N o =T ;
P h ¼ N h =T
T = total number of specimens counted
N s = number of specimens of symbiont-bearing taxa
N o = number of specimens of stress-tolerant taxa and
N h = number of specimens of other small taxa
The FI was designed as a simple, low-cost, singlemetric, preliminary assessment tool to predict if prevailing
water quality is sufficient to support coral-reef growth or
recovery. The numerical basis for the formula is that an
assemblage of 100% other small taxa yields an FI = 2.
Any addition of symbiont-bearing taxa raises the FI, any
addition of stress-tolerant taxa lowers the FI from that reference value. An assemblage totally dominated by other
smaller foraminifers indicates there is too much food for
symbiont-bearing foraminifers to occur in any abundance
FORAM INDEX
415
and Shinn, E. A., 1996. Sea-level records at $80 ka from tectonically stable platforms: Florida and Bermuda. Geology, 24(3),
211–214.
Muhs, D. R., 2002. Evidence for the timing and duration of the last
interglacial period from high-precision uranium-series ages of
corals on tectonically stable coastlines. Quaternary Research,
58, 36–40.
Muhs, D. R., Wehmiller, J. F., Simmons, K. R., and York, L. L.,
2003. Quaternary sea-level history of the United States. Developments in Quaternary Science, 1, 147–183.
Multer, H. G., Gischler, E., Lundberg, J., Simmons, K. R., and
Shinn, E. A., 2002. Key Largo Limestone revisited: Pleistocene shelf-edge facies, Florida Keys, USA. Facies, 46,
229–272.
Neumann, A. C., and Macintyre, I. G., 1985. Response to sea
level rise: keep-up, catch-up, or give-up. In Proceedings of
the 5th International Coral Reef Congress, Tahiti, Vol. 3,
pp. 105–110.
Porter, J. W., and Porter, K. G. (eds.), 2002. The Everglades, Florida
Bay and Coral Reefs of the Florida Keys: an Ecosystem Sourcebook. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press.
Shinn, E. A., 1963. Spur and groove formation on the Florida reef
tract. Journal of Sedimentary Petrology, 33, 291–303.
Shinn, E. A., 1980. Geologic history of Grecian Rocks, Key Largo
Coral Reef Marine Sanctuary. Bulletin of Marine Science, 30,
646–656.
Shinn, E. A., Hudson, J. H., Halley, R. B., and Lidz, B. H., 1977.
Topographic control and accumulation rate of some Holocene
coral reefs, South Florida and Dry Tortugas. In Proceedings of
the 3rd International Coral Reef Symposium, Miami, Florida.
Geology, Vol. 2, pp. 1–7.
Shinn, E. A., Reese, R. S., and Reich, C. D., 1994. Fate and Pathways of Injection-well Effluent in the Florida Keys. U.S. Geological Survey Open-File Report 94–276, 116 pp.
Shinn, E. A., Smith, G. W., Prospero, J. M., Betzer, P., Hayes, M. L.,
Garrison, V., and Barber, R. T., 2000. African dust and the
demise of Caribbean coral reefs. Geophysical Research Letters,
27(19), 3029–3032.
Toscano, M. A., 1996. Late Quaternary Stratigraphy, Sea-level History, and Paleoclimatology of the Southeast Florida Outer Continental Shelf. Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, St. Petersburg,
University of South Florida, 280 pp.
Toscano, M. A., and Lundberg, J., 1998. Early Holocene sea-level
record from submerged fossil reefs on the southeast Florida margin. Geology, 26(3), 255–258.
Toscano, M. A., and Lundberg, J., 1999. Submerged late Pleistocene reefs on the tectonically stable S.E. Florida margin: highprecision geochronology, stratigraphy, resolution of substage
5a sea-level elevation, and orbital forcing. Quaternary Science
Reviews, 18, 753–767.
Cross-references
Accommodation Space
Acropora
Airborne Dust Impacts
Back-Stepping
Calcrete/Caliche
Holocene Reefs: Thickness and Characteristics
Last Glacial Lowstand and Shelf Exposure
Ocean Acidification, Effects on Calcification
Patch Reefs: Lidar Morphometric Analysis
Porosity Variability In Limestone Sequences
Sea Level Change and Its Effect on Reef Growth
Sea-level Indicators
Spurs and Grooves
FORAM INDEX
Pamela Hallock
University of South Florida, St. Petersburg, FL, USA
Benthic representatives of the protistan class Foraminifera
have exceptional utility as bioindicators of coastal contamination because they have short life spans and specific
niches, and therefore respond quickly to environmental
change; they are commonly well preserved in the sedimentary record; they are widely distributed, yet generally
regarded as relatively immobile; they are diverse; they
are relatively small, abundant, and easily sampled; their
collection has minimal impact on environmental
resources; and the most stress-tolerant representatives are
often among the last eukaryotes to disappear completely
from heavily contaminated sites (Yanko et al., 1994;
Schafer, 2000). In reef environments, enrichment of nutrients and therefore of organic matter tends to increase abundance and diversity of small, heterotrophic taxa at the
expense of the mixotrophic larger foraminifers that host
algal endosymbionts. Hallock et al. (2003) developed the
Foraminifera in Reef Assessment and Monitoring
(FORAM) Index (FI) to provide a simple, non-invasive
indicator of whether water quality in the environment is
sufficient to support coral-reef growth or recovery. The
FI is calculated from foraminiferal-assemblage data from
surficial sediments and is based on observations that
symbiont-bearing foraminifers and zooxanthellate, reefbuilding corals require similar high water quality. The FI
is somewhat dependent on sediment texture, so sediments
dominated by coarse sands or by very fine sands or muds
do not provide meaningful data.
The FI enumerates foraminiferal taxa into functional
groups, calculated as follows:
FI ¼ ð10 Â P s Þ þ ðP o Þ þ ð2 Â P h Þ
where P s = N s /T,
P o ¼ N o =T ;
P h ¼ N h =T
T = total number of specimens counted
N s = number of specimens of symbiont-bearing taxa
N o = number of specimens of stress-tolerant taxa and
N h = number of specimens of other small taxa
The FI was designed as a simple, low-cost, singlemetric, preliminary assessment tool to predict if prevailing
water quality is sufficient to support coral-reef growth or
recovery. The numerical basis for the formula is that an
assemblage of 100% other small taxa yields an FI = 2.
Any addition of symbiont-bearing taxa raises the FI, any
addition of stress-tolerant taxa lowers the FI from that reference value. An assemblage totally dominated by other
smaller foraminifers indicates there is too much food for
symbiont-bearing foraminifers to occur in any abundance
FORAM INDEX
415