Macroalgae might sound spongy and slimy, but they are more interesting that you think! Did you know that all the oxygen we breathe derives from photosynthetic organisms and that macroalgae play a major role in this process? They have already established their versatility and usefulness in biofuel and textiles, the food industry, and as raw material for biodegradable plastic production. With such a reputation, the decision to take up this topic was a no-brainer!
Tufts of diverse macroalgae in Tjärnö bay
The summer school had begun! We came in throngs from our comfy vacations with bright hopes of contributing to the knowledge circle of macroalgae biology. Reunions were bittersweet, as we met our classmates again and shared our summer adventures to all our friends. We decided to enjoy the peaceful sunset with beers and party the first night under the shooting stars known as the Tears of San Lorenzo.
Breathe - can you sense the calmness?
We got directly set up with the right mood for the summer school the next day: life is tough!
In search of the best snorkeling spot.
After two days of intense brainstorming and project planning, we finally came up with an experimental design! Full of enthusiasm, we hopped into our wetsuits, collected the snorkeling equipment and set out to conduct sampling in the bay. The first thing we needed to do was to select our perfect sampling sites. Seems like an easy task? Not really. As there were many factors we needed to take into account, such as temperature, wave height, wind exposure, light intensity and depth, picking sampling sites and specimen collection turned out to be more time consuming than we had previously thought.
While the others were having fun doing field work, the two members who were left on land set out to build light sensors through Arduino. We had intended to record variables such as lux levels and temperature. However, after building it, we realised that they are too correlated to other variables to produce a meaningful result. Learning Arduino was amazingly mind-opening but it was a shame that we would not end up using it. However, getting acquainted with this easy-to-use and open source platform is something that we deeply cherish, as the promotion of open science is extremely important for all members of our team.
Learning Arduino for the first time might be daunting, but troubleshooting will build your confidence and admiration for it.
Alas! We also learnt that we only had two ovens available in our facilities, which posed as a severe limitation to us. Our protocol indicated a 24-hour baking process, but the space within the oven was limited and could only accommodate the contents from one quadrat. We had 24 samples in mind - this was going to be impossible to finish! We were running out of time.
These complications bore down heavily on us, and the realisation that this ambitious plan needed to be simplified began to dawn on us. Due to the pressures of time and our lack of training for the previous method, we decided to focus on one thing - the epiphytes living on the surface of Fucus serratus. Through the assessment of the differences of Fucus-associated epiphytes between specimens found in rocky shores and sandy substrate. The main goal is to see how thallus (in other words, the whole body) size and complexity affects the community of epiphytes and their diversity.
To our knowledge, even though there are many studies showing that macroalgae diversity is much higher in rocky assemblages than sandy substrates, there is a gap of knowledge regarding epiphyte composition in the same context. Therefore, our hopes are that this study will help to inspire novel research and challenge other scientists to also venture into the bewildering world of macroalgae. We are sure the project will be a lot of fun and cannot wait to write another post - stay tuned!
Tufts of diverse macroalgae in Tjärnö bay
The summer school had begun! We came in throngs from our comfy vacations with bright hopes of contributing to the knowledge circle of macroalgae biology. Reunions were bittersweet, as we met our classmates again and shared our summer adventures to all our friends. We decided to enjoy the peaceful sunset with beers and party the first night under the shooting stars known as the Tears of San Lorenzo.
Breathe - can you sense the calmness?
We got directly set up with the right mood for the summer school the next day: life is tough!
In search of the best snorkeling spot.
After two days of intense brainstorming and project planning, we finally came up with an experimental design! Full of enthusiasm, we hopped into our wetsuits, collected the snorkeling equipment and set out to conduct sampling in the bay. The first thing we needed to do was to select our perfect sampling sites. Seems like an easy task? Not really. As there were many factors we needed to take into account, such as temperature, wave height, wind exposure, light intensity and depth, picking sampling sites and specimen collection turned out to be more time consuming than we had previously thought.
While the others were having fun doing field work, the two members who were left on land set out to build light sensors through Arduino. We had intended to record variables such as lux levels and temperature. However, after building it, we realised that they are too correlated to other variables to produce a meaningful result. Learning Arduino was amazingly mind-opening but it was a shame that we would not end up using it. However, getting acquainted with this easy-to-use and open source platform is something that we deeply cherish, as the promotion of open science is extremely important for all members of our team.
Learning Arduino for the first time might be daunting, but troubleshooting will build your confidence and admiration for it.
Alas! We also learnt that we only had two ovens available in our facilities, which posed as a severe limitation to us. Our protocol indicated a 24-hour baking process, but the space within the oven was limited and could only accommodate the contents from one quadrat. We had 24 samples in mind - this was going to be impossible to finish! We were running out of time.
These complications bore down heavily on us, and the realisation that this ambitious plan needed to be simplified began to dawn on us. Due to the pressures of time and our lack of training for the previous method, we decided to focus on one thing - the epiphytes living on the surface of Fucus serratus. Through the assessment of the differences of Fucus-associated epiphytes between specimens found in rocky shores and sandy substrate. The main goal is to see how thallus (in other words, the whole body) size and complexity affects the community of epiphytes and their diversity.
To our knowledge, even though there are many studies showing that macroalgae diversity is much higher in rocky assemblages than sandy substrates, there is a gap of knowledge regarding epiphyte composition in the same context. Therefore, our hopes are that this study will help to inspire novel research and challenge other scientists to also venture into the bewildering world of macroalgae. We are sure the project will be a lot of fun and cannot wait to write another post - stay tuned!
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