His research also focuses on selective breeding for heat tolerance in corals (as a way of boosting resilience of some reefs to climate change). As a coral reef ecologist, he currently leads the Coralassist Lab at Newcastle University in the United Kingdom. For the last five years, his team have been working closely with the Palau International Coral Reef Center to test ways to identify and selectively breed more heat-tolerant corals. If these methods show promise, James hopes that they can be incorporated into ongoing reef restoration programs to not only restore degraded reefs, but actually increase their chance of persisting in the face of climate change. Follow the Coralassist Lab and James on Twitter.