Dosing Rubidium

[purp]

Or maybe stopping the water changes was what made a difference and not the dosing of the elements? You can't independently verify those because you did them at the same time.

 

[Tjm23slo]

Or maybe stopping the water changes was what made a difference and not the dosing of the elements? You can't independently verify those because you did them at the same time.

Good thought. If I were to take a water sample and ran it to rest for Rb, one does this. Then took another sample 1 month later and Rb is lower would that suggest Rb is being consumed hence used by creatures in the aquarium?

 

[Xero]

I was speaking generally about synthetic salts, and if you read specifically I was talking about aquavitro fuel. Again, I dont dispute Rb is present in seawater or by proxy in synthetic salts because it appears that they are made from evaporating seawater. If that is in fact how it is made, it would then be in all salts made this way. I dispute the necessity of adding something with no proven benefit.

First, you're confusing synthetic salts with non-synthetic salts. If it's synthetic, then by nature, it's NOT evaporated. It's manufactured. Like HW-Marinemix would talk specifically about how it's NOT evaporated, as it's synthetic. Likewise, instant ocean is synthetic. The only salt that seems to claim that it's evaporated is redsea salt, and we haven't been talking about that one.

Some people even make their own salt buying bulk NaCL and mixing in the elements from ESV. I don't really think you understand the process used to make these salts and seem to be shooting in the dark without any burden of proof, which is making it very hard to take seriously.

Multiple companies sell copper bracelets that purportedly improve your balance. Both of them are junk sold by grifters. Multiple companies selling something doesn't mean its a useful product.

Magnets, how do they work? Nice strawman, anyway.

You have 100% missed my point.

Convenient. I'd still like to see that burden of proof regarding your claims about how salt is made.

Bold text speaks to my original point. Selling a little something with lots of free somethings is a sales method, not a gift to mankind.

And you have 100% missed my point - which is that if you actually read what his "moonshiners method" really is - it's nothing but ICP analysis and compensation with a funny name on it. You could do this method without ever looking at a single one of his PDFs or spreadsheets, if you were so inclined. It's just helping do some math for you.

Be that as it may, he's selling something, so he must be the devil.

 

[purp]

Good thought. If I were to take a water sample and ran it to rest for Rb, one does this. Then took another sample 1 month later and Rb is lower would that suggest Rb is being consumed hence used by creatures in the aquarium?

Not necessarily. 1) that assumes that ICP-OES is capable of finely resolving Rb in a saltwater matrix. This is no small feat and the jury is still 100% out on whether or not this is feasible for the several trace parameters of the method, not just Rb and 2) many elements complex in and out of solutions/surfaces/minerals abiotically, so their "consumption" in a closed system may or may not be biologically mediated. I haven't seen a certified seawater standard analyzed for Rb using ICP-OES, so I can't say either way. The fact that seawater standards also don't include Rb should be illuminating on it's own.

 

[purp]

First, you're confusing synthetic salts with non-synthetic salts. If it's synthetic, then by nature, it's NOT evaporated. It's manufactured. Like HW-Marinemix would talk specifically about how it's NOT evaporated, as it's synthetic. Likewise, instant ocean is synthetic. The only salt that seems to claim that it's evaporated is redsea salt, and we haven't been talking about that one.

Some people even make their own salt buying bulk NaCL and mixing in the elements from ESV. I don't really think you understand the process used to make these salts and seem to be shooting in the dark without any burden of proof, which is making it very hard to take seriously.

Pedantry aside, synthetic or not, it doesnt change the underlying point. I would argue that when the insoluble components are added back into evaporated salts that it becomes synthetic, but that's splitting hairs. In evaporated salts there will be Rb inherent. In the "truly synthetic salts" I will mail you a crisp 5$ if you can get an email from a salt manufacturer stating that they purposefully add in a up-to-this-point biologically useless element to their salt. Of course now that they see that there are enough easily-marketed people out there they just might change course.

 

[Copingwithpods]

I would say the same thing about Red Sea except that’s what I was using and my tank was crap. He has guided me from having TN issues, dinoflagellates, turf algae, zero growth and dying corals based on 15% WC every other week with Red Sea Blue bucket to growing, repaired corals without fragging them, colors changing what someone would expect. Changes made. Stop WC, dose RM monthly based on ICP and dose a few elements daily.
I don’t give out faint praise. They main elements I needed to dose were rubidium, fluorine, iodine

Doesn't red sea salt contain Rb and all those other elements anyway? It sounds like you just moved to a more stability based system, dosing some parameters daily and not having bimonthly swings with water changes is inherently better all on its own and could account for your new found success. Same with the awc crowd doing daily 1-3 gallon changes which is more about keeping trace elements stable than it is exporting nutrients.

I get you found success and that's fantastic and I'm happy for you, I'm just having difficulties breaching the gap between "I changed all these habits" and "I attribute my success to this one element" mindset.

 

[Casual_reefkeeping]

Pedantry aside, synthetic or not, it doesnt change the underlying point. I would argue that when the insoluble components are added back into evaporated salts that it becomes synthetic, but that's splitting hairs. In evaporated salts there will be Rb inherent. In the "truly synthetic salts" I will mail you a crisp 5$ if you can get an email from a salt manufacturer stating that they purposefully add in a up-to-this-point biologically useless element to their salt. Of course now that they see that there are enough easily-marketed people out there they just might change course.

The ingredients tab of Tropic Marin Pro reef, includes Rb and others we can't/don't test for.

PRO-REEF SEA SALT - Tropic Marin®

PRO-REEF sea salt has been designed to meet the special requirements of reef aquariums with optimized concentrations of calcium and magnesium.

www.tropic-marin-smartinfo.com

 

[purp]

Right. Do they go to the rubidium store and buy 5 kg of rb and put it in their salt vat? I emailed them, so hopefully we can find out soon.

 

[Lasse]

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Lasse, very interesting Sir, you are in Sweden right?

Yes - I´m living in Sweden. In Europe - is not only the Polish Aqua Forest that start to sell Rubidium - it is the Rubidium solution I use. An Austrian firm Oceamo They also forward barium as important. If you scroll through their homepage you will find some rather thinkable investigation they have done in the news section. Some of the pages are in english - however - most in german. There is some investigations about different reactor media and how they react with barium and siliciaIt is also a very good investigation of different foods content of trace elements Even if you - as I - can´t understand German - it gives a lot just to look at the graphs. However - your surname indicate that you maybe understand German

A question to @Randy Holmes-Farley The fact that it is possible to trace both rubidium and barium in the skeleton matrix of hard corals - is that not reason enough to try to maintain these normal values in seawater? I know of experiences that stone corals in captivity often are very fragile compared with wild stony corals. This maybe could be due of many different reason like faster growth, to much of some components (PO4 as example) but also that the complex matrix of wild corals make then stronger and not so fragile. However - this is not my main goal with this dosing - it is to see if the slow growth and general health and long surviving rate of some of my mushrooms and LPS will be affected of Rubidium. With colouration - I´m rather pleased as it is.

Build Thread - Lasses Dream Build

Great picts and videos Lasse. Thank you. I'm amazed by the quality of those Olympus cameras. I'm tempted to buy my wife the last model as she loves to carry a compact one besides her smartphone. All pictures in my thread before the last three days is taken by my old Olympus TG-3. I love that...

www.reef2reef.com

Here is my latest Triton test

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I dose I, Sr, Fe, Mn and V on a daily basis - therefore I know that I have at least a flux of these elements through the aquarium

My feed is without exceptions only frozen natural food like artemia, freshwater cyclops, black mosquito larvae and mysidae

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Good thought. If I were to take a water sample and ran it to rest for Rb, one does this. Then took another sample 1 month later and Rb is lower would that suggest Rb is being consumed hence used by creatures in the aquarium?

Definitely not an indication that it is useful.

Fresh calcium carbonate surfaces (like growing coral skeletons) binds all sorts of metals. The uranium in the first linked article is a perfect example. It is obviously not useful, it just binds into coral skeletons.

This is a very common misconception among reef hobbyists.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

The ingredients tab of Tropic Marin Pro reef, includes Rb and others we can't/don't test for.

PRO-REEF SEA SALT - Tropic Marin®

PRO-REEF sea salt has been designed to meet the special requirements of reef aquariums with optimized concentrations of calcium and magnesium.

www.tropic-marin-smartinfo.com

"Ingredients" may or may not include a specific rubidium addition . It's presence does not mean they specifically added it by itself.

For example, when I tested Dowflake calcium chloride for my DIY two part, it included many, many other ions, including a lot of potassium.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Good thought. If I were to take a water sample and ran it to rest for Rb, one does this. Then took another sample 1 month later and Rb is lower would that suggest Rb is being consumed hence used by creatures in the aquarium?

Most assuredly not necessarily useful, and also not necessarily used by creatures.

It can simply bind to calcium carbonate surfaces, like uranium and plutonium are known to do. That doesn't mean they are useful.

here's an an example of a typical study, showing metals bind to calcium carbonate:

Removal of heavy metals (Zn, Cr, Pb, Cd, Cu and Fe) in aqueous media by calcium carbonate as an adsorbent

http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.718.3855&rep=rep1&type=pdf

Here's some data for uranium and plutonium getting into coral skeletons. Seems a very strong case to ask the government for plutonium so reefers can experiment on their aquaria. lol

https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Mahmoud_Dar/publication/267751288_Radioisotope_levels_in_some_recent_corals_of_the_northern_Red_Sea_Egypt/links/54593d800cf2cf516483cd73.pdf

 

[purp]

With respect to barium, it seems to be prevailing knowledge that it is simply incorporated into skeletons not because of a biological need, but because it is present in seawater periodically and has similar charge to calcium. It is used frequently to indicate rain (and runoff) from rivers into the reef as well as from deep upwellings.

"As a coral grows, it inadvertently incorporates barium into its skeleton, in rough proportion to the ambient concentration"

Dishing the dirt on coral reefs - Nature

Sediment is bad news for coral reefs. In Australia, large increases in sedimentation were a by-product of introducing intensive agricultural practices, and that may also apply to other parts of the world.

www.nature.com

 

[Reef Quest]

Seeing positive results with extra additional supplement of Oceamo Rubidium on our display aquarium.

 

[Lasse]

In the poll there is one that report bad result. Please describe this in the thread.

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Lasse]

Definitely not an indication that it is useful.

Fresh calcium carbonate surfaces (like growing coral skeletons) binds all sorts of metals. The uranium in the first linked article is a perfect example. It is obviously not useful, it just binds into coral skeletons.

If I understand you right you mean that presence of these different ions/compounds in the coral skeleton not will change the physical properties of the skeleton - either in a bad or good way ?

Sincerely Lasse

 

[purp]

The inclusion is a function of the chemical properties of the mineral skeleton and not the biochemistry.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

If I understand you right you mean that presence of these different ions/compounds in the coral skeleton not will change the physical properties of the skeleton - either in a bad or good way ?

Sincerely Lasse

I’m saying the mere presence does not indicate a positive or a negative effect of that ion on the organism.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Seeing positive results with extra additional supplement of Oceamo Rubidium on our display aquarium.

can you clarify what that mean? You added only this supplement, changed nothing else, and observed what?

 

[Lasse]

I’m saying the mere presence does not indicate a positive or a negative effect of that ion on the organism.

Yes that true - but either me or you know if it is an advantage or not for the whole organism if the skeleton contain these ions. However we know from nature that certain ions/compounds is incorporated both in skeletons and soft tissues and that these organisms have succeeded to survive for a rather long period in different way.

Is it so bad to try to give the organisms an environment that is so near the nature that you can come as long as you do not know (by experiences) if certain ions/compounds is an advantage/disadvantage if they are higher or lower than natural levels?

If you use a holistic approach instead of only look at the small building blocks of what we call life. I´m Europan - the word holistic is not a bad word - not the way it seems to be in the US.

If someone said to me before the millenium shift that cadmium had an biological role I would only laugh but now we know that there is organisms there cadmium has an biological role. Life have learned me that never say never. There is always surprises around the corner.

Once again - I do not know if rubidium in natural concentrations have any enchanted effect on corals or not. I start this thread as an attempt to collect knowledge how frequently use of rubidium is and what effects people may have seen. In the same time time I run a test (subjective - yes) in my own aquarium because there is claims of benefits to corals I have some problems with.

There is indications in least in on animal that rubidium can have some biological effects (the german goath study).

I think I´m known here on R2R to be a fierce opponents to anyone who wants to stop chemicals of all kinds in their aquarium - I prefer natural way of handling problems that can show up. To try to maintain natural levels of different compounds in the water is however another thing.

Sincerely Lasse