1. Get larger sized Botryllus schlosseri (BSc) colonies growing in the lab.

According to Rabinowitz and Rinkevich 2011 we ideally want to have colonies that have somewhere around 200 zooids embedded in the tunic with an average size zooid (or bud) of about 300 um.

Currently, we do not have lab grown colonies of that size (refer to Bsc Health Monitoring Data Sheet).

  1. Although we don’t have colonies at that size that look 100% healthy, I feel it is important that I continue practicing microdissection of the epithelial tissue with wild colonies. The previous time this was done (see Week 01 post) the culture media and plate were very cloudy with white ribbons. This form of contamination is not commonly seen and I suspect it had to do with the use of Coral Rx directly before isolation of tissue. The colonies need even more thorough rinsing or more time between dipping and isolation to reduce the load of Coral Rx in culturing solution.