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Maddux Alexander Springer was freediving in Hawaii when he noticed green sea turtles with huge tumors.
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He spent 2.5 years researching the disease and discovered a solution as well as its possible root cause.
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Regeneron won a $10,000 prize for the university at the International Science and Engineering Fair.
Maddux Alexander Springer spent his pandemic free time on the blue waters of Oahu.
Every day, the high school student released seahorses, eels and octopuses into his home aquariums, walked a short distance to Kāneʻohe Bay and went free diving.
“You’re almost like an alien,” Springer, now 18, told Business Insider. “You’re actually alone in this environment where you don’t belong.”
But sometimes it looked like he was wandering into a cemetery. He kept seeing green sea turtles with cauliflower-like tumors.
“They were gross masses that were anywhere from the size of a dime to the size of a football. And they would contain green sea turtles,” he said. “They’re in their eyes, on their skin, on their fins, everywhere. And there would be turtles dying at the bottom of the ocean with these tumors.”
He began scouring the internet for an answer. The turtles had a disease called fibropapillomatosis, or FP for short. It affects 97% of all sea turtles, but scientists don’t fully understand what causes the disease to spread, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
This disappointing Google search launched Springer into a two-and-a-half-year investigation. Green sea turtles are vital to the health of reefs around the world because they eat algae that can smother corals. Ultimately, FP poses a threat to coral reefs everywhere, which are already under pressure from rising ocean temperatures and acidity.
Springer may have gotten to the root of the disease’s spread on Oahu. Even better, he came up with a clear solution.
Last week, he won the $10,000 Peggy Scripps Prize for Science Communication for his work presented with more than a thousand students at the Regeneron International Science and Engineering Fair. The money will be used for post-secondary education, but he hopes the award will also bring attention to FP and the plight of sea turtles.
“It was an incredible feeling to have my research validated,” he said. “It’s been a long time since I felt like some changes could be made from my research.”
Solving a biological mystery
At the beginning of his investigation, Springer applied for permits that would allow him to biopsy the turtles’ tumors. But it was rejected.
Determined not to give up, he set out to find a non-invasive way to conduct his research. He donned diving gear and set up motion-activated underwater cameras to take photos of green sea turtles.
Tumors caused by FP can only form internally if they have already formed externally; these images therefore gave him a count of all FP-infected turtles in Kāneʻohe Bay. The data confirmed their previous observations; FP was quite common.
However, the herpes virus that causes FP must be activated by an external factor before it can produce these tumors. Previous biopsies of green sea turtle tumors had shown that they contained high levels of the amino acid arginine. Maybe that was the trigger, but where would the turtles get so much arginine?
Algae is the main food source for sea turtles, and they are not picky eaters. They will eat whatever species is available. Through a photographic survey, Springer found that most of the algae in Kāneʻohe Bay are invasive.
These invasive algae are extremely good at absorbing sewage water. It actually absorbs 11 times more than natural algae, converting the rich nitrogen in wastewater into arginine, which the algae stores in their tissues, Springer said.
Indeed, there was likely a source of sewage on Oahu entering the ocean.
“Septic tanks are a huge problem in Kāneʻohe Bay and Hawaii in general,” Springer said.
Septic tanks are pits dug under houses to collect wastewater. There are no barriers around them, so water leeches blend into Hawaii’s porous, volcanic soil. During high tide, this wastewater is drawn into the ocean.
400 hours diving for algae
Springer had his doubts, but he had to test them.
So he spent his weekends and evenings after school collecting seaweed samples, drying them, and crushing them into powder. He then sent them to a laboratory to run them through a mass spectrometer, a machine that reveals the elements in a substance.
He was looking for a specific nitrogen isotope associated with human wastewater and found it. This confirmed that the algae was actually absorbing the wastewater.
Sea turtle food was rich in arginine, which causes FP.
After two and a half years and 400 hours of diving, Springer found a link between widespread FP and wastewater pollution in Kāneʻohe Bay.
Students’ research at ISEF does not meet the standard of peer review that studies published in scientific journals such as Nature must meet. More research is needed to confirm the causal link Springer may have discovered.
“I believe this study demonstrates a significant relationship between wastewater discharge and this disease,” Springer said. He fears that if left untreated, the entire marine ecosystem will be devastated.
Saving Hawaii’s sea turtles
In total, there are 88,000 septic tanks in Hawaii and 11,000 on Oahu alone, according to the Hawaii Department of Health.
Springer says the solution is to get rid of these septic tanks and direct domestic wastewater to treatment plants. This will prevent dirty water from polluting Hawaii’s oceans and making sea turtles sick.
Springer admitted that building wastewater treatment plants and the infrastructure needed to transport sewage to those facilities would be expensive. But based on his research, he thinks this is an issue that requires urgent attention.
“If we continue to go at this rate and continue to release raw wastewater into the bay, the environmental destruction will be unparalleled,” he said.
However, it is not just the cost that prevents this. In 2017, the Hawaii legislature passed Act 125, which protects the state from having to remove septic tanks by 2050. According to Springer, that’s not soon enough.
“Hawaii really needs to step up, put the money down. I know it’s going to be expensive, but in the end it’s going to be worth it because 2050 is an unacceptable date and it needs to happen now otherwise there will be unforeseen environmental devastation that will occur,” he said.
Currently, the state legislature is considering a bill that would impose a “pollution fee” on homeowners with septic tanks by 2025. That money will be transferred to a new fund to alleviate the effects of septic tanks, Honolulu Civil Beat reported.
This may be a step in the right direction, but Springer hopes his research will help bring more attention to the urgency of this issue.
“I really want to raise awareness that this is a problem and the only way it can be solved is through government intervention,” he said.
Springer plans to further his scientific career at Oregon State University, where he will pursue an undergraduate degree in marine biology.
“I’m excited to explore a new place and do more research on new problems that exist because research is problem-focused,” he said. “I feel like this would be a fun way to get more into research and dive deeper into the issues that fundamentally control our environment and make our ecosystem work.”
Read the original article on Business Insider