Data for: A flow cytometric study of planktonic populations for the evaluation of biofouling control in district cooling plants

The data attached here represent the core data for a 2019 flow cytometry (FCM)-centered study to evaluate biofouling control programs at 3 full-scale district cooling plants (DCPs) in the Middle East. The data shows raw flow cytometry results from staining water samples from these plants with SYBR Green 1 (FL1 channels) or propidium iodide (FL3 channels). Staining with SYBR Green 1 was used to discern between planktonic cells and debris in the sample, whereas propidium iodide was used to enumerate membrane-compromised cells. This data can be used to calculate the number of intact (essentially living) cells in the samples which , when combined with the below metadata, can be used to reveal spatiotemporal dynamics in planktonic counts of biofouling communities. From these dynamics, an evaluation of the biofouling management practices at the study DCPs can be made. The data is compatible with computational FCM pipelines in R and the results of a computational FCM analysis have been submitted for publication under the above title. DCP_FCM_data.zip - The data consist of 1,244 flow cytometry files in FCS format. FCS files were generated on an Accuri C6 Plus flow cytometer. FCS files represent samples collected from three locations (designated A- make-up water faucets, B - water cooling towers and C - condenser outlet waters) from each of 3 district cooling plants (designated KC, RB and YI) daily over a 5 week sampling period in 2019. Files are named based on the position of the sample in the Accuri workspace file (indicated by an alphanumeric, e.g. B01) followed by our lab's standardized sample ID conventions which take the format [Plant]-[site]-[sample type]-[status]-[sample no.] and are annotated based on the stain applied as follows: "-SG.fcs" are samples stained with 1 x SYBR Green 1, "-PI.fcs" are stained with 6 micromolar propidium iodide and "-US.fcs" are unstained control samples. File names also indicate whether the sampling point was A- active (in use) or D- deactive (on standby) at the time of sampling and "W"- simply indicates that the samples are of type "water". DCP_metadata.csv - Metadata describing the DCPs from where the samples were taken to contextualize the flow cytometry data for analysis in R. This data is composed of plant metadata taken directly from the SCADA systems on site and water chemistry data that was acquired in lab (TIC, TOC, conductivity and pH). Sample name column matches those of the FCS files and can be used to assign this metadata in R. "NA"- indicates where the data point was not available