At a company where I work we use a machine that cuts copper and
leaves lots of little copper filings. We use vegetable oil (not
mineral oil) as a lubricant on this machine (actually cottonseed
oil). Over the past year a brilliant purple growth of what looks
like algae under a microscope has grown on the pile of copper and
oil. I took a sample of the growth and put it in a petri dish with
just the cottonseed oil. No new growth and the algae in the oil
changed color and looks a little brown. I put the copper filings in
another dish with oil and algae sample and it lived. It grew faster
outside indicating to me photosynthesis might be going on, although
it could still be bacteria rather than algae growth.

Can anyone suggest what kind, perhaps even what species, of organism
I have on this machine?


Thanks, Robert Mockan.
--
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