Tank Acclimation Follow Up: Secrets of Benificial Bacteria

This is a follow up post to Tank Acclimation Phase I.

From the National Science Foundation posted today June 30, 2010 excerpt:

Bonnie Bassler spends her days listening to bacteria talk to one another, and what she has overheard may surprise you.
It turns out that these tiny, single-celled organisms are taking roll call. Each whispered conversation is an attempt to count how many of their own kind are present before they try to mount an attack on their host organism, which might very well be your body.
As Bassler explains it, bacteria "are too small to have an impact on the environment if they simply act as individuals." What they lack in size, though, they make up for in numbers.

And . . . ?  Well if you are interested in cultivating beneficial bacteria in your aquarium's filter to balance the nutrients in the water column, this article may be of interest to you.  It is the beneficial bacteria cultivated during tank cycling that does the heavy lifting in the balancing of your aquarium's biosphere.  Thanks to Ms. Bassler and the National Science Foundation for the additional insight.
[Read the rest of the NSF article]