Examining the Relationship Between Nitrogen Levels and Chlorophyll Levels in Bodies of Water in NYC

By: Tzippora Applebaum, Joedell Bastien, Jacqueline Liang

The lakes and rivers in New York City are home to a wide array of species, but did you know that harmful algal blooms and high chlorophyll levels can threaten the biodiversity within the city’s waters? We examined the relationship between nitrogen levels and chlorophyll levels in bodies of water in NYC in order to determine if a relationship between harmful algal blooms and increased nitrogen content exists.

The purpose of our study was to investigate if there was a relationship between nitrogen levels and chlorophyll levels in order to determine the impact of nitrogen levels on the growth of harmful algal blooms. Harmful algal blooms utilize nitrogen as a food resource so we hypothesized that elevated nitrogen levels can lead to more harmful algal blooms and increased levels of chlorophyll. We collected data regarding nitrogen and chlorophyll levels from harbor water in New York City. After analyzing the data, we concluded that there is no definitive relationship between nitrogen levels and chlorophyll levels that would indicate an impact on the population of harmful algal blooms. This was supported by our findings which depicted inconsistent nitrogen and chlorophyll levels throughout the duration of testing. Therefore, we concluded that obtaining more samples from different bodies of water and testing more parameters would be necessary in order to fully investigate our hypothesis. We believe it is important to continue investigating the relationship between nitrogen and chlorophyll levels in order to determine the impact of nitrogen on harmful algal blooms and chlorophyll levels.

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