{"id":14862,"date":"2016-05-12T16:19:42","date_gmt":"2016-05-12T20:19:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thenatureofcities.com\/?p=14862"},"modified":"2026-04-15T04:12:58","modified_gmt":"2026-04-15T08:12:58","slug":"look-whos-coming-to-dinner-bacteria-that-eat-the-gowanus-sludge-tnoc-podcast-episode-7","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thenatureofcities.com\/TNOC\/2016\/05\/12\/look-whos-coming-to-dinner-bacteria-that-eat-the-gowanus-sludge-tnoc-podcast-episode-7\/","title":{"rendered":"Look Who&#8217;s Coming to Dinner&#8230;Bacteria that Eat the Gowanus Sludge\u2014TNOC Podcast Episode 7"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2 class=\"audioalbum\">Look Who's Coming to Dinner...Bacteria that Eat the Gowanus Sludge<\/h2><p class=\"audioalbum\">TNOC Podcast Episode 7<span><\/span><\/p>\n<div class=\"track\"><span class=\"songtitle\">Play Episode<\/span><span class=\"audiobutton\"><\/span><div class=\"albumtrack\" style=\"visibility:hidden;\"><audio class=\"wp-audio-shortcode\" id=\"audio-14862-1\" preload=\"metadata\" style=\"width: 100%;\" controls=\"controls\"><source type=\"audio\/mpeg\" src=\"http:\/\/www.thenatureofcities.com\/TNOC\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/This-is-TNOC-Episode-07-BK-Reactor-.mp3?_=1\" \/><a href=\"http:\/\/www.thenatureofcities.com\/TNOC\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/This-is-TNOC-Episode-07-BK-Reactor-.mp3\">http:\/\/www.thenatureofcities.com\/TNOC\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/This-is-TNOC-Episode-07-BK-Reactor-.mp3<\/a><\/audio><\/div><\/div>\n<p>Also available at\u00a0<strong>iTunes<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_14866\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-14866\" style=\"width: 300px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-14866\" src=\"http:\/\/www.thenatureofcities.com\/TNOC\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/1200819.jpg\" alt=\"Bringing together specialists across disciplinary boundaries, sediment sampling has occurred across 14 sites and 3 seasons. Photo: Josh Johnson (www.joshethanjohnson.com)\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-14866\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Bringing together specialists across disciplinary boundaries, sediment sampling has occurred across 14 sites and 3 seasons. Photo: Josh Johnson (www.joshethanjohnson.com)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p><strong>Story notes:<\/strong>\u00a0The Gowanus Canal in Brooklyn is well known throughout New York City as a nearly two-mile-long trench filled with sewage and chemicals left behind by years of neglectful pollution.<\/p>\n<p>Though the canal is slated for a multi-million dollar cleanup courtesy of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.epa.gov\/superfund\">U.S Environmental Protection Agency Superfund Program<\/a>, a team of local scientists, landscape architects, and community activists have discovered a very different kind of remediation effort underway in the sludge beneath the bottom of the Gowanus.<\/p>\n<p>This podcast episode, produced by Philip Silva, catches up with members of the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.bkbioreactor.com\/\">BK BioReactor<\/a> project and their efforts to find out whether anything can live in the sort of toxic habitat provided by a place like the Gowanus Canal.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-14880\" src=\"http:\/\/www.thenatureofcities.com\/TNOC\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/BKBR_Phylo-Tree_RGB-LEFT.jpg\" alt=\"BKBR_Phylo Tree_RGB LEFT\" width=\"604\" height=\"819\" \/><\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_14881\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-14881\" style=\"width: 604px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-14881\" src=\"http:\/\/www.thenatureofcities.com\/TNOC\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/BKBR_Phylo-Tree_RGB-RIGHT.jpg\" alt=\"This phylogenetic tree illustrates the diversity of life found in the Gowanus Canal, a result of its parent microbiological makeup, the introduction of foreign materials through increased trade and shipping, and subsequent adaptations to the urban, industrial environment. Credit: BK BioReactor team (www.bkbioreactor.com).\" width=\"604\" height=\"780\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-14881\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">This phylogenetic tree illustrates the diversity of life found in the Gowanus Canal, a result of its parent microbiological makeup, the introduction of foreign materials through increased trade and shipping, and subsequent adaptations to the urban, industrial environment. Credit: BK BioReactor team (www.bkbioreactor.com).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<figure id=\"attachment_14868\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-14868\" style=\"width: 300px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-14868\" src=\"http:\/\/www.thenatureofcities.com\/TNOC\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/P1300344-747x560.jpg\" alt=\"Left to right: Matthew Siebert, Ian Quate, and Elizabeth Henaff of BK BioReactor. Photo: Josh Johnson (www.joshethanjohnson.com)\" width=\"300\" height=\"225\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-14868\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Left to right: Matthew Seibert, Ian Quate, and Elizabeth Henaff of BK BioReactor. Photo: Josh Johnson (www.joshethanjohnson.com)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Despite all the pollution, it turns out that the canal is teeming with microscopic life, and some kinds of bacteria are actually able to live on the waste that humans have left behind. Not just the sewage, either. Some bacteria seem to be able to feed off the industrial solvents and petrochemical products that line the bottom of the canal. As these microbes nosh their way through the potluck of pollutants on the E.P.A.\u2019s list of hazardous substances, they break them down into safer compounds and elements, leaving the canal just a tiny bit less toxic over time\u2014a long, long time.<\/p>\n<p>BK BioReactor is a collaboration between <a href=\"http:\/\/elizabeth-henaff.net\/\">Dr. Elizabeth Henaff<\/a>, a researcher at <a href=\"http:\/\/weill.cornell.edu\/\">Weill Cornell Medical College<\/a>, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ianquate.com\/\">Ian Quate<\/a>, a designer at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nbwla.com\/\">Nelson Byrd Woltz Landscape Architects<\/a>, and Matthew Seibert, the Creative Director of <a href=\"http:\/\/www.landscapemetrics.com\/about\/\">Landscape Metrics<\/a>. The project also draws support from <a href=\"http:\/\/genspace.org\/\">GenSpace<\/a>, a community biotechnology lab in Brooklyn, and the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.gowanuscanalconservancy.org\/ee\/\">Gowanus Canal Conservancy<\/a>, a group working to clean up the watershed that drains into the canal.<br \/>\n<strong><br \/>\nPhilip Silva\u00a0<\/strong><br \/>\nNew York<\/p>\n<p>On\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.thenatureofcities.com\/TNOC\/\/TNOC\/\">The Nature of Cities<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Also available at\u00a0iTunes. Story notes:\u00a0The Gowanus Canal in Brooklyn is well known throughout New York City as a nearly two-mile-long trench filled with sewage and chemicals left behind by years of neglectful pollution. Though the canal is slated for a multi-million dollar cleanup courtesy of the U.S Environmental Protection Agency Superfund Program, a team of [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17,"featured_media":14870,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[299,279,297],"tags":[23,89,62],"coauthors":[169,361],"class_list":["post-14862","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-essay-place-and-design","category-podcast","category-essay-science-and-tools","tag-north-america","tag-pollution","tag-water"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thenatureofcities.com\/TNOC\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14862","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thenatureofcities.com\/TNOC\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thenatureofcities.com\/TNOC\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thenatureofcities.com\/TNOC\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/17"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thenatureofcities.com\/TNOC\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14862"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.thenatureofcities.com\/TNOC\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14862\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":60634,"href":"https:\/\/www.thenatureofcities.com\/TNOC\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14862\/revisions\/60634"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thenatureofcities.com\/TNOC\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14870"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thenatureofcities.com\/TNOC\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14862"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thenatureofcities.com\/TNOC\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14862"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thenatureofcities.com\/TNOC\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14862"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thenatureofcities.com\/TNOC\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=14862"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}