Israeli researchers have pioneered a coral reef restoration project in Fiji, melding ancient pottery techniques with cutting-edge 3D printing technology. This is how they enlisted nine local chiefs – and how living in a village without electricity helped them succeed
Moshe Gilad. November 17, 2025
This story could not be more distant from everything happening in Israel every single day. Yet the study carried out on a remote coral reef in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, somewhere in Fiji, on the other side of the world, is entirely Israeli. It stars researchers from Bar-Ilan University and the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology, Israeli-developed technology, an intriguing study and meaningful work – rich in knowledge, curiosity and kindness – that could greatly improve both the environment and daily life of a Fijian community.
It combines basic handmade pottery, using some of humanity’s oldest techniques, with new, expensive and sophisticated hi-tech. It’s a story about innovative uses of the oldest ceramic material: red soil, also known as clay.
There are no obvious intrigues here, no cynicism, rivalries or sharp conflicts. The researchers I spoke to praised each other, smiled and displayed genuine human interest and curiosity. Strange how rare that feels today. It’s worth noticing such encounters. They may not be commonplace, but they are joyful and heartwarming.
Marine biologist Prof. Oren Levy of Bar-Ilan University studies coral reefs. His research focuses on synchronicity, reproduction and the biological clock mechanism in corals. His lab studies how light and temperature affect the biological clock under stable conditions and stress. His other expertise is coral reef restoration.
“There is a basic, repeating mistake about artificial reefs,” Levy explained. “They used to think that whatever you throw into the sea – corals will grow on it. They sank ships, threw in tires and erected statues, but nobody had the courage to say: this is toxic and harmful. Corals do not grow on this junk. The ceramic materials we bring as part of our initiative improve the reef and increase biodiversity.”
Levy’s research partner is Prof. Ezri Tarazi, head of the Technion’s graduate program in Industrial Design. Tarazi intuitively “gambled,” as he puts it, on using clay as a basis for restoring coral reefs. The gamble proved serendipitous.
‘It’s important to remember that without a healthy coral reef – they would find it hard to go on living there. In a short time, we succeeded in designing, producing, drying out, firing and even placing in the water a ceramic reef built by locals themselves.’
Ceramic specialist Oren Arbel
“In addition to being natural, clay is also porous and ‘drinks’ water together with other reef components,” says Tarazi. “Compared with cement, where nothing wants to adhere, everything wants to adhere to clay. So, we gain nutrients that are essential to the growth of living things. Clay is neither acidic nor impermeable like metal. The sea has become humanity’s garbage dump. In experiments we initially conducted in Eilat using clay reef models, a ‘super-reef’ was formed. Coverage was swift and growth was commendable. After a while, you could no longer see the ceramic.”
Tarazi then acquired for his Technion lab a 3D clay printer he says is “the biggest in the world.” Standing four meters tall, it’s a huge machine. He initially worked with Prof. Nadav Shashar, and later with his current partner, Prof. Oren Levy.
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“Our guiding principle was the coral reef’s need to be complex and diverse. If we shape it in a pattern, all parts will be identical. Using a 3D printer, we were able to produce varied, complex components. An industrial designer with expertise in 3D printing can create an infinite variety of shapes. Every print is different, and over time we became more sophisticated.”
Biologist Prof. Oren Levy explains the next stage of the research, still in Israel: “We went scuba diving in Eilat. We found a reef that we could assess in terms of the variety of animals living in it, scanned its shape in 3D and printed that shape. This created an almost perfect facsimile of nature. The ceramic material itself is cheap and available almost anywhere in the world. For every reef, you can fit a specific shape.”
At this point, he pulls up on his computer beautiful photographs of a thriving coral reef taken near the Trans-Israel Pipeline’s oil jetty in Eilat. “What you see here is after just three years, and you can no longer see any of the ceramic at all. If you had put a tire there, this would have looked completely different. We made sure that the diversity that developed resembled natural diversity. We also confirmed that the ceramic material had no adverse effect on the environment.”
I was bewitched by them
The experiment in Eilat has been underway for five years now, and Levy and Tarazi describe it as a major success. The next stage involved asking how the reef’s complexity related to the success of restoration. The conclusion was clear: the more complex the structures, the more diverse the range of animals on the reef.
At this stage, while on sabbatical, Levy felt the need to take one step further – to leave the lab, take to the field and apply the research in the real world. He approached an American nonprofit, Pacific Blue Foundation, which operates in Fiji. It’s main focus is improving the lives of Pacific island communities. Its activity in Fiji focuses on an the Beqa (or Mbengga) Lagoon, where it operates community projects in nine villages. Also nearby is a holiday resort known for scuba diving, mainly with sharks.
Immediately after my meeting with Levy, I looked up the lagoon where the study was done. Beqa Lagoon is a small island, about five kilometers south of Fiji’s main island. A tiny spot in the ocean, some 2,000 kilometers east of Australia and north of New Zealand. It’s considered one of Fiji’s finest and most exciting diving spots. Fiji itself is made up of 322 islands, only 106 of which are settled. Its total land area is much like Israel’s, but fewer than a million inhabitants live across the islands combined. In February 2025, Fiji announced its intention to open an embassy in Jerusalem.
“For us this was our first opportunity to work with a community,” Levy continued. “On our first visit to Fiji, I went with the nonprofit’s director, David Kline, and we did some underwater work. I was bewitched by them. Island residents live right on the reef; its health is their health. They have no electricity or running water. All energy is solar. Most of the water supply comes from collecting rainwater. It’s a very tightknit community, and never in my life have I met such happy and optimistic people. There are 20 to 40 families in each village. Every village has a chief, and to work there you need the approval of all nine tribes. You don’t really feel the central government in daily life. If you want to do something, the chiefs will assemble and they’ll decide what you can and cannot do.”
Kline, the nonprofit’s director, visited all the villages, took part in kava ceremonies – a drink made from the yaqona plant, served in social functions – and earned the village elders’ approval. “In September 2024, we began restoring the reef. I suggested we bring the ceramic technology from Israel, and we received a three-year grant from the Schmidt Family Foundation (founded by former Google CEO Eric Schmidt and his wife Wendy, M. G.). The project received $150,000 for the first year, rising to $250,000 in each of the following two years. Together with Tarazi and ceramic specialist Oren Arbel, we formed a plan.
“Since travel is expensive, we decided to undertake three projects simultaneously. For the first one, we brought in an artificial structure, that is: units printed at the Technion. For the second project, we started a ceramics workshop for locals, in order to make – without advanced 3D printers – ceramic units that we could place on the seabed. Since there isn’t even a kiln there for us to fire the clay, we had to find other solutions. We built six metal frames to ‘plant’ in the ocean, then placed the ceramic structures on them – one printed structure that we brought from Israel and one made by local workshop participants. We taught them how to make the correct ceramic structures by hand. We then dived with them to place these structures at depths of six meters and 12 meters in the ocean.
“These units encourage spontaneous settlement by animals, and any broken-off piece of coral on the seabed can be immediately replanted, like you would in a flowerpot. At the same time, we carried out a biological experiment – the third project – in which we looked at various populations in another area, one hour away by boat. We observed other coral populations there. We then took different types of corals from various areas and exposed them to temperature shifts. This study hasn’t yielded any final results yet – we only spent three weeks there.
“One study we applied in Fiji,” Levy adds, “focused on strengthening the reef. The question is how can you double or triple the amount of coral in a reef? What we really want is to create resilience by growing many corals at different depths. If temperature is too high at a certain depth – we can sink the reef deeper. In this way, we create additional reefs at depths where there is still a chance. Success rates are high – these days, we achieve almost 100 percent coral survival on our structures. If you take such a reef and transfer it to a new area, you can use it to establish a new reef, because it takes all the ingredients with it – from microbes to algae to everything required for a healthy reef.”
The Fiji team included seven researchers from Israel (Including Levy, Tarazi and Arbel) and two German researchers. They were joined by Kline from the United States, a Fijian nonprofit staff member and two Fijian potters from the main island. Levy carefully spells out participants’ names for me, explaining that it’s important to mention them, as this is a tightknit group. I promised they would all be duly acknowledged, and here they are, the people of the Fiji reef project: Jodie Marcus, Titusi Dardara, Tom Delena, Haim Parnass, Lidor Strotzer, Noa Belcher, Inbal Eilon, Abigail Tarnolond and Clara Sukong.
Prof. Tarazi says that during their stay in Fiji, everything came together into one cohesive whole. He lists the components of the whole: the villages, the resort, the international nonprofit, local diving traditions, locals’ dependency on diving tourism, the village elders, the central government, the reef itself and its unique corals. The connection between all these components, he calls “a joint move of high-level design and high-level biology. A unique research case emerged here – in both design and biology. There aren’t many such cases of cooperation between design and biology.” The uncertainty throughout their stay in Fiji, he says, was tremendous, but by the end of the process everybody involved felt elated.
The potters are coming
Oren Arbel is a ceramic designer who trained at Bezalel after spending several years visiting communities where people still use traditional methods to produce functional pottery. He lived for two months in a village on the Tanzania-Kenya border and later spent time at the home of a potter in Georgia.
The process connecting ethnography, tradition and society, with clay as a glue, has preoccupied him for many years. His graduate academic work explored the links between ancient technologies and experimental archaeology, and he’s currently pursuing his doctorate at the Technion.
Tarazi was his supervisor, and a few years ago invited him to take part in developing artificial coral reefs made of clay using a 3D printer. At first, the whole thing sounded too technological for him and far from his field of interest, but at some point Arbel decided to join the study he now calls “an amazing experience.”
“Our initial model,” Arbel adds, “was to use industrial clay produced in Germany, do the 3D printing in Israel, then deliver the printed objects to a distant location, wherever it may be, put them in the ocean and go back home. But in Fiji we realized this wouldn’t work, and we went through a different, place-specific process. Very early on we realized that reef-dependent countries cannot take part in the current process because 3D printing requires resources and advanced technology, while the island we arrived in doesn’t even have continuous electricity.
“In a process focused on a specific ecosystem, the two crucial terms are ‘locality’ and ‘involvement.’ These issues are close to my heart, but they require thorough research. I made early contact with local Fijian potters. We realized we needed to shift to handmade techniques that don’t require electricity, and in fact, we needed to research the characteristics of the community. We found out that they cook their food in traditional shallow pits, using slow cooking – which resembles what I know of primitive ceramic burning technologies, without a kiln.
“We then contacted potters that mine their clay from the banks of a river that flows into the ocean, relatively near our destination. This isn’t foreign clay – it’s local material, which of course minimizes our carbon footprint. In addition, we wanted to undertake a process that involved the local community. Ten villagers took part in the professional workshops we gave for two weeks, and it was great fun working with them.”
During his stay in Fiji, Arbel lived separately from the delegation at a local house. He says the reason for this was simple: “When we arrived in Fiji and I realized I was supposed to sleep a 20-minute boat ride from the workshop site, that seemed to me neither good nor suitable. I asked the people we met to spend the night at the village, near the workshop site.
“They agreed, and I lived for a few weeks at villager family’s home. There’s no running water in the house, the toilets are outdoors, the roof is corrugated metal and the walls are cement blocks.
“Being present in the village in this way helped me realize what needs to be done. Village teenagers joined us very quickly. It felt like a lot of factors were working together to help the project succeed. We couldn’t believe, for example, that the material would dry out in time, given the high humidity – but it did, and we managed to get it all in the water.
“It’s important to remember that without a healthy coral reef – they would find it hard to go on living there. In a short time, we succeeded in designing, producing, drying out, firing and even placing in the water a ceramic reef built by locals themselves. We now see the potential this thing has for other reef-dependent communities around the world. We always think about technology as progress, which is true, but it must be applied in a way that fits the target community.”
Levy, Tarazi and Arbel are already preparing to continue the project. They hope to go back to Mbengga Lagoon to run another workshop. “Success, for us, will be if they realize how to take care of the reef. There’s a lot of education and awareness involved. We want visitors to arrive in the village, undergo a workshop with the locals and help restore the reef.”