A new platform technology can assess water safety and quality with just a single drop and a few minutes. Likened to a pregnancy test, the handheld platform uses one sample to provide an easy-to-read positive or negative result. When the test detects a contaminant exceeding the EPA’s standards, it glows green. Led by researchers at Northwestern University, the tests can sense 17 different contaminants, including toxic metals such as lead and copper, pharmaceuticals, cosmetics and cleaning products. The platform — which is powered by cell-free synthetic biology — is so flexible that researchers can continually update it to sense more pollutants.
The research was published in the journal Nature Biotechnology. Lucks is a professor of chemical and biological engineering in Northwestern’s McCormick School of Engineering and a member of the Center for Synthetic Biology. Jaeyoung Jung and Khalid Alam, members of Lucks’ laboratory, are co-first authors of the paper.
“To ensure access to safe and clean drinking water, we need technologies that will allow easy monitoring of water quality,” Lucks said. “With a simple, easy-to-use, handheld device like ROSALIND, you can test the water in your home or out in the field — where you would want to use it most.”
Source: Water World
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