In April, the members of the Environmental Biotechnology Lab (Dr. Holly Bowers, Olivia Pawlyk, and Hannah McGrath) and Biological Oceanography Lab (Dr. Sarah Smith, Katie Duncan, and Katie Roy) traveled to Golden, Colorado to compete as the Pond Doctors in the first 2022-2023 Algae Prize Competition hosted by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) and sponsored by The Department of Energy Bioenergy Technologies Office and the Algae Foundation. The Algae Prize competition was geared towards developing novel solutions to support large scale algae commercialization. The Pond Doctors presented their work in developing and testing a tool that measures nitrogen stress of microalgae in near real-time, specifically diatoms which are a group of ecologically and industrially relevant microalgae. It was an honor and privilege for our graduate students to be a part of this competition and meet so many passionate and talented individuals.