New BGSU Center to Study Freshwater and Human Health

BOWLING GREEN – A new research center at Bowling Green State University aims to significantly expand the way scientists investigate harmful algal blooms that cost Americans about $ 2 billion a year in costs, ranging from lost leisure at the more expensive water treatment.

The Lake Erie Freshwater and Human Health Center will receive multi-million dollar federal funding to research the causes and possible solutions for algae blooms nationwide. George Bullerjahn, one of BGSU's best-known algae researchers, said the center should eventually help predict both the onset and toxicity of Lake Erie algae blooms each summer.

A press conference announcing the BGSU Lake Erie Center is planned on campus, as well as a panel and reception scheduled for later today at the National Museum of the Great Lakes on Front Street in East Toledo.

Funding for the creation of this center comes from a $ 5.2 million grant over five years, awarded by the National Science Foundation and another major federal program, the National Institute of environmental health sciences. The latter, which carries the abbreviation NIEHS, is one of 27 institutes and centers belonging to the National Institutes of Health.

NSF and NIEHS have also pledged $ 30 million to do more research on freshwater on the causes and possible solutions of algal blooms. Part of this grant is to be used to study the proliferation of algae in the oceans and estuaries, according to a press release.

"The grant provides BGSU with the resources to become a national leader and builds on our previous collaborations," said Bullerjahn, who will head the new BGSU center as director and chief investigator, in a statement. Press.

In his release, BGSU President Rodney Rogers said the federal grants "show our support and appreciation for the quality and importance of our research on harmful algal blooms" .

BGSU is one of the region's leaders in the study of algal blooms from a global perspective.

The University won a major federal grant after the Toledo Water Crisis in 2014 to organize on its university campus a two-day forum that brought together seaweed researchers originating from ############################################################################# Asia, Africa, Europe and the whole world. Presentations at this 2015 seminar showed common denominators: climate change and land misuse, with agricultural runoff still higher in most affected regions of the world.

BGSU's three best-known algae researchers – Mr. Bullerjahn, Tim Davis and Mike McKay – traveled to Lake Victoria, Africa, last spring to study algal blooms.

Everyone knows other hotspots, such as Taihu Lake in China, the Florida Everglades, the Pacific Northwest and many parts of Canada.

Other researchers involved in the new BGSU center include Tom Bridgeman, director of the UT Lake Erie Center; Steven Wilhelm, a researcher at the University of Tennessee, and Hans Paerl, a researcher at the University of North Carolina.

The center will be the result of a collaboration between BGSU and nine other universities and research institutes, including the University of Toledo, the University of Michigan and Ohio State University. The Ohio Sea Grant, the National Ocean and Atmosphere Administration, Michigan State University, the State University of New York, the University of Tennessee, and the University of North Carolina are also part of partners.