Cadiz, 4A: Winogradsky Column Report- Group A4 - First week

Hello everyone, this is the first out of several posts that we will be publishing in this platform about our Winogradsky column. My partners and I are 3 students in Cadiz's University, currently in our 1st year of the Biotechnology degree.

For our Winogradsky column we used sandy beach sediment from Rio San Pedro's beach, to which we added two different calcium-based compounds: calcium carbonate (CaCO₃) and calcium sulphate (CaSO4). We also put some motor oil in the mixture to have more carbon based components; then we stirred it all inside a bucket. Once it got to the optimal texture, we used an improvised funnel to pass it from our bucket to an Aquarius bottle, which acts as the recipient of the Winogradsky column. Finally, we added some seawater to create a humid/stagned eviroment for the bacteria to grow.

We placed it in the corner of an outside porch, in a place where the bottle wouldn't directly face the sun yet it would be illuminated enough on one of the sides.

Not much has grown yet, but we expect to see some more bacteria soon. The black and green spots on the sides of the bottle are sulphur reducing, but nothing else has grown yet. 

The brown colour can be explained by the presence of anaerobic bacteria in addition to the the sulphur reducing ones. However, we are not able to witness any life in the top of the bottle, where the seawater remains almost transparent.

Here are some photos of the column:

The location of the bottle: Day 1

This two photos are from the first few days

Our Winogradsky column after a week; we think that those black spots are correspond to the sulphur reducing bacteria.

This is everything for now, we'll keep updating the status of the bottle every week. Feel free to leave any comments below and enjoy!