Experiment Update

Unfortunately, because I am at the mercy of an extremely busy college student, my algae observation experiment has not officially begun yet. However, it has not been completely abandoned and I have started the process of getting the tanks holding the experiment ready.

A couple of weeks ago, all the water in the tanks was removed and Ali and I, slowly but surely, cleaned the salt, plastic, and gunk covered glass. Once that was done, bleach water was pumped through all 12 tanks for several days later. A few days later, the bleach was drained and fresh water was put in. A week after that, even more water was put through after another draining session.

Once the second round of fresh water was pumped through, I went through and cleaned all the salt caked onto the back of all the tanks, a task that took me several hours and reminded me of all the cuts that I have on my hands. The tanks are now officially ready for salt water that we plan to get directly from the ocean down below the lab.

How we plan to get all this water is still relatively unknown. One of the outreach workers has a giant pump which we may be able to use, although the ocean is REALLY far away from the tanks in order for a hose to reach both. Like I mentioned before, there is no fast way to do anything at The Biosphere. In addition, Ali still has not been able to talk to the outreach specialist due to contrasting schedules.

There has been some progress, though, not too long ago, a new UofA intern, Peri, and I went down to the ocean to collect algae samples and, hopefully, sometime soon, I will know what kind of algae is growing in the ocean.

Here's to hoping that sometime soon we can officially begin the experiment so I have something to present at the end of all of this.