Dear colleagues
We are having a lot of difficulties removing green algae from a duckweed taken from a pond. We tried several attempts with sodium hypochlorite at different concentrations until the wild duckweed borders turned white. Also, we tried covering the growth flask with aluminum foil, and this prevented the algae growth, but after removing this cover, we noticed that the algae were still there, and it started increasing again...
I would appreciate it if you have any suggestions or recommendations.
Thanks in advance
Try these methods. 1) Place powdered Calcium carbonate in the container along with the contaminated duckweed + algae. This carbonate will absorb CO2 present in water converting itself into bicarbonate, which is soluble in water. In this way, the CO2 is prevented for its availability to the algae and the algae will die. Cover the total surface of the container but below the superficial duckweed foliage, to ensure that atmospheric CO2 doesn't diffuse into the container.
2) For the algae to survive, it needs light, hence cover the whole of the container just below the foliage of duckweed so that the algae doesn't get any light. Additionally cover the whole of the outer surface of the container with black paper/cloth - if the container is transparent - to prevent light from entering the container. All the algae will die in 3-4 days.
3) Give a very high amount of light from below the transparent container. This high Lux cannot be tolerated by the algae and hence the algae are expected to die. Here a standardization of tolerance of light intensity from below by duckweeds will have to be carried out to reach the final result.
Chandravadan Trivedi, thank you for your kind suggestions. To prevent CO2 / light from being available for algae, a container with low surface area would be better. I will try that! Thank you again.
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