There's a white mucky substance at the bottom of the Gowanus Canal, but nobody knows exactly what it is. Within a few weeks, though, we may soon have the answer, thanks to the efforts of Nasreeen and Niloufar Haque:

"Members of the Urban Divers, a group of about 150 volunteer scuba divers fighting pollution in local estuaries, got the Haques a sample of the murky white stuff, called "Bio-film." It is thought to be colonies of microbes or other living matter that floats in clouds near the bottom of the Gowanus."

The Gowanus, of course, is popularly known as one of the most polluted waterways in New York.