Feb 18, 2014 03:30 PM EST By Staff Reporter, UniversityHerald Reporter

In a partnership with philanthropist Phyllis Taylor of the Patrick Taylor Foundation, Tulane University is offering $1 million to the team that can solve hypoxia, or the absence of oxygen, of a 5,840 square mile (last summer's measurement) "dead zone" in the northern sector of the Gulf of Mexico, the Nola Defender reported. The issue is pertinent to the New Orleans area where Tulane is situated not only because it borders the Gulf of Mexico, but also because run off from the Mississippi River, which cuts through the region, directly causes the hypoxia. In a body of water without oxygen, fish can't survive.

Anyone is eligible for the million bucks, according to Taylor's post on Tulane's website. In conjunction with her late husband, who made his fortune in oil (and whose name bears the foundation's name), she's endorsing a "market-based" solution to the environmental issue.

"Our family's business was successful because innovation, an entrepreneurial spirit and risk-taking were at the heart of it," Taylor wrote. "I have always believed that these same qualities are vital to solving critical social and environmental challenges. The grand challenge includes all of these principles."

Dubbed the Tulane University Grand Challenge, even its slogan is closely tied to the potential financial benefits.

"Find a solution to restore our water in the Gulf of Mexico and across the world and win a million dollars," it goes.

Taylor's husband also inspired her philanthropic ways. According to her website, he helped establish a college tuition program based on merit over the ability to pay, or what is now referred to as a "need-blind" program.

Hypoxia in the Gulf of Mexico is the most dramatic example in the United States, and the second largest area worldwide, according to gulfhypoxia.net. Its primary cause, at least in the described region, is fertilizer run-off. Rivers over-enriched by fertilizers overproduce algae, the start of a process that leads to oxygen depletion where the river ends, in this case the northern part of the Gulf of Mexico.

Based on the parameters of the contest, the million dollars may remain unclaimed, for it only goes to those who solve the issue, and not simply the best idea.

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