Transfer of microorganism facilitated by ballast water Transfer of microorganism facilitated by ballast water Microbial organisms are major constituents of shipboard ballast water.
Researchers find large volumes of bacteria and viruses discharged into ports worldwide.
It has long been known that such discharges have unintentionally spread plankton, shellfish and fish from one body of water to another, sometimes with major impacts to the receiving ecosystem. Lead researcher Gregory Ruiz, from SERC, reports in Nature that he and his colleagues have found high concentrations of discharged microbes in the ballast water of ships arriving in Chesapeake Bay from foreign ports. Until these studies by Greg Ruiz and his colleagues, Tonya Rawlings, Fred Dobbs, Lisa Drake, Timothy Mullady, Anwarul Huq and Rita Colwell, the global movement of microorganisms via ballast water discharges was virtually ignored. The research was funded largely by the Maryland Sea Grant and the National Sea Grant College programs. Ruiz says that although there is no reported evidence of outbreaks of human diseases from non-indigenous microbes in ballast water, the findings indicate the need for much greater concern than has heretofore been shown.