City Steps up Bioremediation of Algae in Carroll Creek

We have all waited with great anticipation for the development of the Carroll Creek Promenade through downtown. As many of you know, seasonal flooding of Carroll Creek has prevented development of the of area historically. Back in the late 70’s, after flooding of a good portion of downtown following hurricane Agnes in 1972, the idea of a flood control project (with associated retail development) was born. The past few years have seen the project come to fruition, with new Condos popping up and restaurants like La Paz, the Green Turtle and Hinode all drawing attention.

One problem became obvious in the middle of last summer season: the flow in the creek was so slow that algae soon overtook the scenic waterway, rendering it a sludgy, slimy, smelly green cesspool. A process we biologists refer to as eutrophication. This is a bit of a misnomer and has always fascinated me with respect to etymology. From the Greek eutrophos, well-nourished : eu-, meaning “good” and trephein, to nourish. But from a practical stand point, this really comes to mean making waters rich in mineral and organic nutrients that promote a proliferation of plant life, especially algae, which reduces the dissolved oxygen content and often causes the extinction of other organisms.

I was interested to read in the Gazette yesterday that the City has contracted a firm, Bioverse, of Minnesota, to take action against our beloved slime. They will install a number of AquaSpherePRO devices, which are spheres of beneficial bacteria and enzymes: a Probiotic prescription, of sorts.

We hope that the combination of the Bioremediation and improved water flow (which increases to dissolved oxygen and inhibits algae formation) will work and we can walk along the creek this summer unencumbered by the stench that is biology.

Genome Projector

I ran across this neat little tool called the Genome Projector via My BioTech Life. It’s a Google Maps based graphics program which contains 320 bacterial genomes and gives you a zoomable view of circular DNA sequences, pathways and a DNA walk. It’s pretty cool and I’ll link it in the Gene Jockey section later. Why don’t you give it a try?