‘Bubble Barrier’ Wins Great Lakes Invasive Carp Challenge

The State of Michigan has announced Edem Tsikata, a software consultant, as the grand prize winner of the Great Lakes Invasive Carp Challenge, a worldwide search for ideas to stop invasive Asian Carp from entering the Great Lakes and doing irreparable ecological damage to Michigan’s signature and defining natural resource. Boaters can and have been injured when hit by leaping invasive silver carp weighing up to 40 pounds.
Tsikata’s Cavitation Barrier to Deter Asian Carp would utilize a row of specially designed propellers to generate a wall of cavitation bubbles that implode and emit high-speed jets of water. The painful sensation of the bubbles along with the noise of the propellers would repel fish and prevent their passage beyond the bubble barrier.
In June of last year, a silver carp was caught just nine miles away from Lake Michigan below the electric barrier system designed to keep invasive carp out of the Great Lakes. A bighead carp was also captured below the barrier system in 2010.
To learn more about Michigan's efforts to block Asian Carp, visit BlockAsianCarp.org.