The Effects of Pulsed Streamerlike Discharge on Cyanobacteria Cells

Recently, cyanobacteria blooms (or water blooms) occurred on the surface of water bodies frequently and extensively due to eutrophia of the water. That has posed more and more serious environmental problems worldwide. In this paper, the effects of pulsed streamerlike discharge on M. aeruginosa cells are reported, which are one genus of cyanobacteria and ease to form water blooms. A stainless needle with a diameter of 30 mum was employed as a point discharge electrode, which is 15-cm apart from the cylinder cathode, and a 2-mus 160-kV pulse was applied. A pulsed streamerlike discharge was obtained in the water filled with cyanobacteria cells (named as sample water in this paper). From the experimental result, it can be found that the discharge collapsed the intracellular-structure gas vesicles in the M. aeruginosa cells, and the colonies of the cells sank to the bottom of the discharge chamber and rotten gradually.