EPA Office of Water Support

In September (16-20) 2014, members of the Editorial Review Board, Environmental Protection Agency representatives, academics and web designers joined to discuss planning for the future of the project. As a result of that meeting, the EPA Office of Water is providing $50,000 for development of taxon pages in 2015. We hope that this effort will significantly boost the number of "problem" taxa and bring the project closer to providing identification and assessment tools needed by students, analysts, academics and managers. This year, the following work is planned:

Rex Lowe - $11,000 Lowe will complete taxon pages for species that have been confusing to bench analysts and centric diatoms from lentic habitats. Cymbella delicatula, Microcostatus krasskei, Cocconeis disculus, Encyonema auerswaldii, Discostella stelligera, Discostella pseudostelligera, Cyclotella meneghiniana, Cyclotella comensis, Cyclotella distinguenda, Cyclotella atomus, Spicatacribra kingstonii, Humidophila contenta, Humidophila paracontenta, Humidophila undulata.

Pat Kociolek - $11,000 To increase the utility of the Diatoms of the US website, we will work on and finish webpages related to the following taxa: Gomphonema apuncto, Gomphonema grunowii, Gomphonema pygmaeum, Hantzschia amphioxys, Nitzschia angustata, Nitzschia angustatula, Nitzschia frustulum, Nitzschia gracilis, Nitzschia siliqua, Nitzschia subacicularis, Reimeria sinuata fo. antiqua.

Mark Edlund and David Burge - $11,000 Following review of the original Diatoms of the US priority species list, the most commonly identified taxa in the NLA program, as well as taxa in need of greater diversity, taxonomic clarification, or completion, we propose to create species pages based on the following list of centric and confusing eunotioid taxa. We will also create three genus-level pages including Semiorbis, Pleurosigma and Handmannia. Aulacoseira islandica, Cyclostephanos invisitatus, Cyclostephanos tholiformis, Cyclotella bodanica var. affinis, Cyclotella delicatula, Cyclotella michiganiana, Cyclotella ocellata, Puncticulata bodanica, Stephanodiscus hantzschii, Stephanodiscus hantzschii fo. tenuis, Stephanodiscus medius, Stephanodiscus minutulus, Eunotia formica, Eunotia monodon, Eunotia pectinalis, Eunotia pectinalis var. undulata, Eunotia bilunaris.

Sarah Spaulding - $6,000 Spaulding will use funding for travel to bring younger scientists and analysts into the collaborative flora project, with the intent that they will continue to be involved in the community of contributors. We will investigate NAWQA collections from US rivers in a workshop at the Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel University, scheduled for May 2015. The week-long workshop will include Potapova, Spaulding, David Burge, Ian Bishop, Melissa Vaccarino and Gina LaLiberte. Two taxon pages will be completed by the group working together, learning the literature and slide resources of the diatom herbarium. Each of the participants will then work on one of the taxa and present the taxonomic, nomenclatural and identification issues to other workshop participants. Spaulding will supervise the completion of the taxon pages, obtain scanning electron micrographs, and ensure that the pages are submitted for review before June 15, 2015. We plan to address the taxa: Craticula accomoda, Craticula ambigua, Craticula submolesta, Craticula molestiformis, Craticula dissociata, Craticula riparia.