Global grassroots lake science network has roots in Wisconsin – July 19, 2010
by David Tenenbaum
Inspired and led by freshwater scientists at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, researchers eager to understand global ecosystems from end to end are now monitoring a series of buoys in lakes on every continent except Africa. Each buoy carries instruments to measure fundamental data on the weather above the water and the temperature and chemistry below it.
The buoys are linked through GLEON — the Global Lake Ecological Observatory Network — but the motivation is mainly local, says UW-Madison limnologist Timothy Kratz, who chairs the network’s advisory board.
The network represents a grassroots approach to large-scale science, says Kratz. “We have these large, top-down initiatives, where all the instruments are as similar as possible, but this network is very much bottom-up. Each site already has its own local reasons for getting measurements. Banding together in the network makes the process more efficient, so we don’t repeat each other’s mistakes…”
Confronting toxic blue-green algae in Madison lakes – July 1, 2010
by David Tenenbaum
Harmful algal blooms, once considered mainly a problem in salt water, have been appearing with increasing severity in the Madison lakes, and a team of UW-Madison researchers has geared up to understand the when, where and why of these dangerous “blooms.”
No longer just a smelly, unsightly nuisance, the masses of blue-green algae can also exude toxins that attack the liver or nervous system.
One day, it may be possible to issue “algae forecasts” modeled on predictions of severe storms, says Katherina McMahon, a professor of civil engineering and bacteriology on campus. Eventually, she says, the results of research at UW-Madison could lead to a forecast: “Given the conditions today, we estimate an 85 percent chance of toxic blue-green algae tomorrow…”
From sky and lake, researchers study blue-green algae – April 2010
by Renee Meiller
It’s an unseasonably warm, early-April Friday afternoon in Madison, Wisconsin, and the calm day polishes the Lake Mendota surface to a sheen that’s just shy of glass.
A vintage flat-bottomed Boston whaler chugs slowly away from a dock adjacent to the famed University of Wisconsin-Madison Memorial Union Terrace. Soaking up the sun and expansive lake views, hundreds of Terrace-goers stare bemusedly at the whaler: Bobbing at the end of its tow rope is a 6-foot-tall, sunshine-yellow oceanographic buoy.
Its destination is the geographic center of Lake Mendota — essentially, the lake’s deepest point…
