Right now, the world’s reefs are “losing corals faster than they can be naturally replaced.” In a bid to restore degraded reef systems, a team of engineers in Australia has developed a robot that seeds the reefs with coral that can live at higher temperatures.

You see, corals typically reproduce en masse at night—once a year, when the moon, tides, and temperature are right, a blizzard of billions of eggs and sperm floats from corals to the surface of the water for fertilization. In a week or less, new coral larvae begin to restock the reef. But as coral reefs collapse—from heatwaves in the ocean, overfishing, pollution, and other problems—some reefs don’t have enough coral left to successfully spawn and rebuild a damaged reef. That’s why the engineers have developed a robot that replicates this reproducing process by delivering tiny new corals to reefs that need it most.

Basically, what the engineers are doing is raising corals inside enclosed areas for five to seven days until they are ready to be replanted. But rather than replant the corals by hand, the robot can help cover much larger areas or 1,500 square meters in an hour. It is navigated through the reef using computer vision and is controlled by a tablet. When it gets to a damaged part of the reef, it releases the baby coral and moves on to plant the next one. Thus far, the researchers say the process works, but more time will be needed to see just how successful this robot really is.