TFH stands for Tropical Fish Hobbyist, which is an aquarium hobby magazine. The month and year of the magazine which the article is published in is listed above.
Dynamic Aquaria is IMHO a book that should belong in each aquarist's library. Even if one doesn't ever use an Algae Turf Scrubber, the book offers a good introduction into ecosystem dynamics, trophic structures, and other important biological concepts. More importantly, he explains how these concepts apply or play out within a captive system, such as an aquarium.
I'm not sure how much Eric has looked into the efficiency of an ATS or skimmer in terms of removing toxic compounds, but he did mention in his article that he had success growing Acropora and other 'sps' corals in close proximity to Softies. So one could presume these toxins are being taken care of somewhere, or perhaps the softies became accustomed to the presence of other stonies and reduced the amount of these compounds produced. I'll let Eric elaborate here since it was his tank.
As for the turf screen, it appears to be a plastic mat with holes in it. Kinda like plastic window screening, except the size of these holes wouldn't keep any bugs out.
there are two layers of this material. HTH
Shane,
Thanks for the links.