A mathematical model to restore water quality in urban lakes using Phoslock

Abstract

<p style='text-indent:20px;'>Urban lakes are the life lines for the population residing in the city. Excessive amounts of phosphate entering water courses through household discharges is one of the main causes of deterioration of water quality in these lakes because of the way it drives algal productivity and undesirable changes in the balance of aquatic life. The ability to remove biologically available phosphorus in a lake is therefore a major step towards improving water quality. By removing phosphate from the water column using Phoslock essentially deprives algae and its proliferation. In view of this, we develop a mathematical model to investigate whether the application of Phoslock would significantly reduce the bio-availability of phosphate in the water column. We consider phosphorus, algae, detritus and Phoslock as dynamical variables. In the modeling process, the introduction rate of Phoslock is assumed to be proportional to the concentration of phosphorus in the lake. Further, we consider a discrete time delay which accounts for the time lag involved in the application of Phoslock. Moreover, we investigate behavior of the system by assuming the application rate of Phoslock as a periodic function of time. Our results evoke that Phoslock essentially reduces the concentration of phosphorus and density of algae, and plays crucial role in restoring the quality of water in urban lakes. We observe that for the gradual increase in the magnitude of the delay involved in application of Phoslock, the autonomous system develops limit cycle oscillations through a Hopf-bifurcation while the corresponding nonautonomous system shows chaotic dynamics through quasi-periodic oscillations.