Algal Biotechnology: A Sea of Opportunities, Book of Abstracts

My first encounter with micro algae was at the Presidio of Monterey, California where, as a military laboratory technician I identified Asterionella to be the source of taste and odor in the Presidio's drinking water supply and found it could be corrected by applying and mixing small amounts of copper sulfate into the reservoir and by aerating the water before drinking it. Two years later in the midst of Worlds War II as assistant laboratory officer in a 700 bed station hospital in England I identified Synura as the source of a taste and odor so vile that patients and staff alike were nauseated when attempting to drink the water. Remembering my Monterey experience, we turned to copper sulfate and aeration.These steps improved the water quality so greatly that the Colonel in Charge commended me as an algal expert! Far from true but he had no clue as to what algal expertise involved!