Abstract
Ship ballast water contains high concentration of plankton, bacteria, and other microorganisms. If the huge amount of ballast water is discharged without being inactivated, it will definitely spell disaster to the marine environment. Microalgae is the most common species exiting in ballast water, so the detection of the concentration and viability of microalgae is a very important issue. The traditional methods of detecting microalgae in ballast water were costly and need the help of bulky equipment. Herein, a novel method based on microalgae cell intracellular chlorophyll fluorescence (CF) imaging combines with cell bright field (BF) microscopy was proposed. The geometric features of microalgae cells were obtained by BF image, and the cell viability was obtained by CF image. The two images were fused through the classic image registration algorithm to achieve simultaneous detection of the viability and concentration of microalgae cells. Furthermore, a low-cost, miniaturized CF/BF microscopy imaging prototype system based on the above principles was designed. In order to verify the effectiveness of the proposed method, four typical microalgae in ballast water (Platymonas, Pyramimonas sp., Chrysophyta, and Prorocentrum lima) were selected as the samples. The experimental results show that the self-developed prototype can quickly and accurately determine the concentration and the viability of microalgae cells in ship ballast water based on the dual images of BF and CF, and the detection accuracy is equivalent to that of commercial microscope. It was the first time to simultaneously detect the viability and concentration of microalgae cells in ship ballast water using the method that combining the fluorescence and bright field images; moreover, a miniaturized microscopic imaging prototype was developed. Those findings expected to contribute to the microalgae detection and ship ballast water management.
Highlights
Ship ballast water is the sea water loaded in the cabin to control the draught of the hull and improve the stability and maneuverability of the ship
Ship ballast water contains a lot of bacteria, viruses, and plankton
Based on the above principles, we developed a miniaturized and portable bright field (BF)/chlorophyll fluorescence (CF) dual microscopic imaging system using low-cost CMOS components [36,37]
Summary
Ship ballast water is the sea water loaded in the cabin to control the draught of the hull and improve the stability and maneuverability of the ship. When ships berth at the wharf, the ballast water must be loaded or discharged to ensure smooth sailing [1,2]. It is estimated that more than 10 billion tons of ballast water was transferred by ships in the world every year. Ship ballast water contains a lot of bacteria, viruses, and plankton. If the huge number of organisms in the ballast water directly discharged into the destination sea without inactivated, it will inevitably cause the invasion of alien species and spell disastrous consequences for the ecological environment [3,4,5,6,7]. Ship ballast water must be inactivated before being discharged [8,9,10]
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