Natural Wonder: Pink Lakes

Australia has an impressive collection of pink lakes, and Lake Hillier is one of the most popular. It is located on an island off the southern coast of Western Australia. The bright pink color does not change even if the water is poured into a container. Other pink lakes change color depending on the season, angle of sunlight, or air temperature. Hiller Lake stays the same shade of pink throughout the year, thanks to the presence of the algae Dunaliella salina, red halophilic archaea, and other microorganisms.

In Koyash Lake, located on the Crimean Peninsula, the color of the water varies from pink to red, depending on the season. Like many saltwater lakes, it is filled with halobacteria, microorganisms that produce a pink protein when absorbing solar energy.

Pink lakes are not only beautiful, but also useful for the prevention of many diseases. Dunaliella salina is a unique organism that can synthesize useful compounds such as b-carotene provitamin A, glycerol, and unsaturated fatty acids in extremely high salt concentrations. Check out these and other pink lakes in Sputnik’s photo gallery!

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Lake Sasyk-Sivash in Evpatoria, Crimea.

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Saki healing lake is located between Saki and Evpatoria in Crimea.

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Laguna Colorada is a shallow salt lake located in southwest Bolivia.

CC BY 3.0 / Pavel Špindler / Laguna Colorada, Bolívie

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The pink lake of Torrevieja is located in Parc Natural de Las Lagunas de La Mata y Torrevieja, Spain.

CC BY-SA 3.0 / Moisés Pastor / Parque natural de las Lagunas de La Mata y Torrevieja

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Picture of a laid-down boat seen on the Rose Lake during the 15th and final stage of the Dakar Rally.

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Heavy machinery is being used at salt evaporation ponds in Narta lagoon near the city of Vlora, by the Adriatic sea, southwest Albania, where some ponds have turned pink due to halobacteria and microscopic algae. Albania has been a traditional producer of sea salt, which nowadays is mainly destined for export to Western markets.

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A woman and her dog pose beside a lake that has turned a vivid pink thanks to extreme salt levels, further exacerbated by hot weather in a startling natural phenomena that resembles a toxic spill, in Melbourne on March 4, 2019. - The natural spectacle is the result of green algae at the bottom of the lake at Westgate Park on the outskirts of Melbourne responding to high levels of salt and changing color.

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A large flock of flamingos are seen wading in Laguna Colorada located within the Eduardo Abaroa Andean National Fauna Reserve in the highlands of San Luis, near the border with Chile, in Bolivia's Uyuni salt flats. The Uyuni salt flats are estimated to contain 10 billion tons of salt - of which 25,000 tons are extracted every year - as well as 100 million tons of lithium, making it one of the largest global reserves of this mineral, according to state officials at the Bolivian Mining Corporation (COMIBOL).

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Fishing boats seen on Lake Rose in Dakar, Senegal.

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Picture of one of the pink salt evaporation ponds at Las Coloradas, in the Rio Lagartos Municipality on the northern coast of the Yucatan Peninsula, Mexico. The water gets its pink tint from red algae, plankton and brine shrimp.

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This pink lake is in Ras Al Khaimah in the United Arab Emirates. Its pink hue is the effect of red algae, which caused the water to change color.