More than 844 million people around the globe lack access to clean water. One of the challenges is that bacteria from rivers can flow into groundwater sources, polluting what may have been potable drinking water. Building new infrastructure to reroute clean water is expensive, especially for regions that already struggle with extreme poverty. Instead, communities often rely on water filtration systems. Current methods of testing water safety can be expensive and time-consuming. Researchers first take samples at the water source and bring them back to the lab. Then they test the samples to determine which types of bacteria are present and this process is way too lengthy. So what should be done now to avoid a global water crisis as soon as possible?
“It usually takes hours or days, and to process the data and get results takes another few hours,” says Jianfeng Sun, a doctoral student in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Northeastern University. Working with fellow doctoral student Ran and undergraduate student Derek Tran, Sun is developing a new method that’s faster, easier to use, and portable. They knew that some types of bacteria in rivers aren’t a concern. They won’t pollute groundwater because they won’t ever reach it, instead of getting stuck in the sand or soil of the riverbed.
However, they found that some bacteria will squeeze through the soil column and make it to the other side. That non-sticky stuff can be problematic. Since it’s not adhering to the soil or sand, it may hitch a ride on the river current all the way into a town’s source of drinking water and make people sick. To make this system portable, Sun knew he used the microscope to be able to connect with a cellphone and developed a mobile application that analyzes bacteria the microscope sees. That way, researchers translated into more efficient water filtration, which has the potential to save lives all over the world.
Harminder Singh