WHOI research associate Justin Ossolinski built narrow tanks that allowed scientist Ben Van Mooy to bathe bacteria-covered plates in a small volume of continuously flowing seawater. The plates had been placed in Vineyard Sound until a robust biofilm of microbes developed. Then they were brought into the lab and placed in the tanks. By selectively filtering out specific kinds of cells, Van Mooy was able to determine the rates of cell settling, proliferation, detachment, and predation on the biofilm. (Photo by Tom Kleindinst, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)[back]
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