Great Lakes Center for Fresh Waters and Human Health

The Great Lakes Center for Fresh Waters and Human Health (the Center) at the University of Michigan (UM) is building on five years of successful interdisciplinary collaboration and community engagement to further our understanding of the critical risk that cyanobacterial harmful algal blooms (cHABs) pose to freshwater ecosystems and human health, which now occur in all five Great Lakes. This Center, led by a multi-institutional team of biomedical scientists, limnologists and community engagement experts with an extensive history of working together, seeks to advance the work begun in Lake Erie, which has experienced the most severe cHAB events in the last decade–including a 2014 episode that led to a complete shutdown of the Toledo, OH, water supply. The Center’s four research projects will directly address overarching themes prioritized by the COHH4 program. First, we will specifically resolve dynamics of the development of blooms, production of toxins, and transport of those toxins in the Great Lakes and in the atmosphere. Second, we will study toxins and mechanisms of toxicity, including identification of emergent toxins and determination of health risks associated with airborne and waterborne toxins. Third, we will develop new technologies for enhanced monitoring and forecasting; we will collaborate with colleagues at NOAA and the Cooperative Institute for Great Lakes Research (CIGLR) to integrate our findings into state-of-the-art forecasts and other data products that reach a wide stakeholder audience. Fourth, we will leverage an extensive network of community engagement vehicles in the Great Lakes, including the Michigan and Ohio Sea Grants, public health departments, state and local agencies, the Great Lakes Integrated Science Assessment (GLISA), and community science initiatives involving Lake Erie Charter Boat captains and the U.S. Coast Guard. The Center’s Administrative Core is focused on supporting and coordinating the four integrated research projects, a Community Engagement Core, and a Facilities Core, to ensure progress toward the stated goals of understanding and translating cHAB events and their threats to human health in the Great Lakes region.