Harmful algae: CREAN launches its mobile phones application update
March 4th, 2020The i-FAN application available in Google Store (Android) and Apple Store (iOS) is free and will notify users through messages issued to their mobile phones, every time an area contemplated in Monitoring Programs (Fjord or Pacific ) is updated with main harmful taxa abundance values.
Two years ago, Fisheries Development Institute (IFOP) launched i-FAN its mobile application wich aims to inform and alert Alexandrium catenella presence , main dinoflagellate associated with paralytic toxins poisoning in the country, constituting an early warning about Harmful Algae Blooms (FANs) of this microalgae in 223 stations distributed between Los Lagos and Magallanes regions and Chilean Antarctic belonging to the “ Chilean Fjords and Channels Red Tide Management and Monitoring Program ”.
As of Monday, February 24th, an i-FAN updated version is available for free download, which will incorporate 76 sampling points belonging to the “Management and Monitoring Program for Harmful Algal Blooms and Marine Toxins in the South Central Pacific Ocean from Chile (36 ° – 44 ° S) ”, which extends from the Biobío region to the Aysén region, with stations between 2 and 10 miles. In addition, it will incorporate other harmful taxa information such as Alexandrium ostenfeldii, Dinophysis acuta, Dinophysis acuminata and Protoceratium reticulatum.
Pamela Carbonell Arias, CREAN researcher, explained that the application has a system that allows users to know through a color scale (white, green, yellow, orange and red) the alert state that is conditioned by main harmful taxa relative abundance associated with marine toxins (paralyzing and / or lipophilic) presence.
“By integrating both monitoring to our app, it allows users to know the status of the relative abundances of five harmful taxa, in more than 300 stations distributed between the regions of the Biobío to Magallanes,” said Pamela Carbonell.