Ultrasound Technology - How It Controls Algae

Many people wonder if the concept of controlling algae is really possible with something like sound waves. It sounds like something out of a science fiction novel but the reality is, it's a reality!

Here's a down to earth, simple explanation of how ultrasound works to deal with algae problems.

The best way to describe the way sound waves affect algae, is to picture a tuning fork. If you've ever worked with one of these things, you know that if you strike the fork against an object the forks will begin to vibrate or resonate and create a sound. Depending on the length and configuration of the forks, the sound may be high pitched or low, but each tuning fork is designed to create a particular pitch or sound wave.

What's interesting is if two forks of the same frequency are placed side by side, then one is struck, the vibrations from the first fork will begin to make the other fork vibrate as well. This alignment of frequency is precisely how ultrasound affects algae.

Algae like every other thing on the earth, has a particular frequency associated with it. Each algae cell, depending it's type and configuration, may have a different frequency unique to itself.

The ultrasonic systems in use today have been designed to send out sound waves that are precisely tuned to match the frequencies of many of the known algae types that exist today. They all fall in a relatively tight range of sound, and interestingly, just as with the tuning forks, as the device sends out a series of sound waves, as that match up with particular algae cells, these sells begin to vibrate.

Fortunately water serves as a terrific medium in which sound can travel, often to great distances, without very little power.

Under the bombardment of a consistent wave of sound, these vibrations will ultimately begin to cause damage to the algae cells. In blue green single cell algae, often the air vacuoles or bags, that allow this algae to rise and fall in pond, will become damaged. Since this algae cannot rise to the surface during the day it's not able to gather energy from sunlight, and eventually it will sink to the bottom of the pond and die.

Many types of filamentous algae or string algae as it's commonly known, become damaged on the outter cell wall, and as this begins to break down, even more damange is done internally and the algae cell begins to die.

In terms of fish and wildlife, ultrasound is very safe, because the frequency range that's used to control algae is very different than those that might affect fish and their sensitivities.

In industry, one of the major reasons that algae can cause problems is because something called biofilm, which is a sticky film build up in tanks and containers, provides algae with a prime breeding ground. Ultrasound cannot often reduce biofilm once it's present but after a full cleaning, ultrasonic systems can actually keep biofilm from forming so it provides a remedy in industry as well.

So in simple terms, ultrasonic algae control isn't really magical at all. When you think in terms of frequency and vibration and how sound waves play into the mix, it's a fairly straight forward process that allows chemical free treatment of algae issues in a wide range of places!