Pink lake

Pink lakes arise from a combination of factors, which include climate and hydrology of the continent beneath them, in particular the level of salinity.

The orange/pink colour of salt lakes across the world has often been attributed to the green alga Dunaliella salina, but other work has shown that bacteria or archaea are also involved.

The alga, which was found not to contain a high intracellular concentration, was named after Michel Félix Dunal who first recognised the red colour of certain salt lakes in France was due to an organism.

[2] In some of the hundreds of Australian pink lakes, a red bacterium, Salinibacter ruber, may be involved in producing their colour.

Work done by molecular biologist Ken McGrath at on Lake Hillier, on Middle Island in Western Australia led by molecular biologist Ken McGrath in 2015 showed that, while D. salina was present in only tiny quantities (0.1% of DNA sampled), while S. ruber formed 20[1] to 33%[6][7][5][a] of the DNA recovered from the lake.

A lake in Westgate Park, Melbourne, Australia, was coloured pink in March 2017[10] and then again in September 2019, but since then and as of January 2022[update] had taken on a dark green hue.