AI-based coral species discrimination: A case study of the Siderastrea Atlantic Complex.

Species delimitation in hard corals remains controversial even after 250+ years of taxonomy. Confusing taxonomy in Scleractinia is not the result of sloppy work: clear boundaries are hard to draw because most diagnostic characters are quantitative and subjected to considerable morphological plasticity. In this study, we argue that taxonomists may actually be able to visually discriminate among morphospecies, but fail to translate their visual perception into accurate species descriptions.