Research Interests

• Outbreaks of noxious algal species: predicting community dynamics from physiological ecology. Use of mechanistic and empirical approaches to understand single species outbreaks, algal community structure and yield; food web dynamics and algal bactivory in a diversity of aquatic systems (Great Lakes, Shield, alpine and prairie lakes); impacts on surface water quality.
• Taste and odour (T/O) and algal toxins in surface waters: terrestrial and aquatic T/O production by algae, actinomycetes and other soil biota; role of environment, climate and watershed.
• Chemical ecology: Are algal odour compounds biologically active? What impacts do they have at different levels of the food web? Cyanobacterial ecology and toxin production: mechanisms facilitating recruitment and dominance of toxic bluegreen algal species; links with avian botulism. Chemical ecology and algal systematics: Linking LM, EM, biochemical and genetic approaches
• Human impacts: on water supply and quality (S. Alberta, Great Lakes); montagne systems (Mountain Parks), wetlands (Georgian Bay), high latitude systems (NWT: mine tailings pond discharge).
• Applied issues: analytical protocol development; source water quality and treatment; role of algal biofilms and mats in human pathogen transport and pooling

 

Selected publications

• Watson, S.B. 2002. Chemical communication or chemical waste? A review of the chemical ecology of algal odour. Phycologia. 42: 333-350
• Watson S.B. and Satchwill T. 2003. Chrysophyte odour production: the impact of resources at the cell and population levels. Phycologia 42: 393-405
• Watson, S.B. and Ridal J. 2003. Periphyton: a primary source of widespread and severe taste and odour. Wat. Sci. Technol. in press
• Watson S.B., Ridal J., Zaitlin B. and Lo A. 2003. Odours from pulp mill effluent treatment ponds: the origin of significant levels of geosmin and 2-methylisoborneol (MIB). Chemosphere 51:765-773
• Watson, S.B., T. Satchwill, E. Dixon and E. McCauley. 2001. Under-ice blooms and source-water odour in a nutrient-poor reservoir: biological, ecological and applied perspectives. Freshwater Biology 46: 1-15
• Watson, S. B., T. Satchwill and E. McCauley. 2001. Drinking water taste and odour: a chrysophyte perspective. Nova Hedwigia 122: 119-146
• Watson, S.B., T. Satchwill and B. Brownlee. 1999. Quantitative analysis of trace levels of geosmin and MIB in source and drinking-water using headspace SPME. Water Research. 34:2818-2828
• Watson, S.B., E. McCauley and J. Downing. 1997. Patterns in phytoplankton taxonomic composition across temperate lakes of differing nutrient status. Limnology and Oceanography. 42: 486-495.
• Watson, S.B., E.McCauley and J. Downing. 1992. Sigmoid relationships between phosphorus, algal biomass and algal community structure. Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences 49:2605-2610.
• Downing J. A., S.B. Watson and E. McCauley. 2001. Predicting Cyanobacteria dominance in lakes Can. J. Fish. Aquat. Sci. 58: 1905-1908.
• Zaitlin B. Watson, S.B. Ridal, J. Satchwill T. and Parkinson D. 2003 Actinomycetes in Lake Ontario: habitats and production of geosmin and 2-methylisoborneol. Journal of the American Waterworks Association 95 (2): 113-118