Bio Nano Consulting: Drink Safe - A low-cost disposable test for arsenic contamination of drinking water

生物纳米咨询：安全饮用 - 饮用水砷污染的低成本一次性测试

• 批准号: 710481
• 金额: $ 12.74万
• 依托单位: THE BIO NANO CENTRE LIMITED
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: GRD Proof of Concept
• 财政年份: 2014
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2014 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=710481
• 关键词: Bio; Nano; Consulting; Drink; Safe

It is estimated by the WHO that 130 million people globally drink water containing arsenicabove safe levels.Because current tests for measuring arsenic contamination in drinking water are semiquantitative,time-consuming and require trained personnel, there is a need for a portable,rapid, inexpensive, accurate and easy-to-use new environmental sensor for use in bothdeveloped and developing countries.Arsenic is a toxic naturally-occurring contaminant that enters aquifers from the dissolution ofarsenic-containing minerals in bedrock and also from human activity such as industrialmanufacturing and mining.Arsenic is toxic even at extremely low levels (WHO recommended levels are 10 ppb) withshort term exposure causing skin lesions, skin cancer and harm to the nervous system, whilelong term exposure leads to fatal internal cancers among 10% of those exposed. Becausearsenic is tasteless, odourless and gives no acute symptoms such as fever or pain until afterprolonged exposure, arsenic poisoning has been justifiably coined the ‘silent killer’, causing apublic health crisis.Water testing is key to arsenic mitigation and management, where the adage ‘what you cannotmeasure you cannot manage’ is pertinent. Current arsenic tests suffer from cost, accuracy,precision, and usability issues which limit the effectiveness and scope of mitigation programs.In fact, ‘field test’ is a misnomer for many products that more closely resemble fieldlaboratories requiring trained personal to perform delicate chemical reactions in the field.Using a unique proprietary enzyme, this project innovatively modifies the technologycontained in familiar glucose home tests manufactured in the billions each year, to create astep-change improvement in arsenic testing by solving customer usability, cost and accuracyneeds. Millions of users have demonstrated the ease-of-use of glucose tests; now similartechnology can be used to transform arsenic testing.This project

据世界卫生组织估计，全球有1.3亿人饮用含砷超过安全水平的水。由于目前用于测量饮用水中砷污染的测试是半定量的、耗时的并且需要训练有素的人员，因此需要一种便携、快速、廉价、准确和易于使用的新型环境传感器，适用于发达国家和发展中国家。砷是一种天然有毒物质，由于基岩中含砷矿物的溶解以及工业制造和采矿等人类活动而进入含水层的污染物。砷即使在极低的水平也是有毒的（世卫组织建议的水平为10 ppb），短期接触会导致皮肤损伤、皮肤癌和神经系统损害，而长期接触会导致10%的人患致命的内脏癌。由于砷是无味、无臭的，而且在长期接触砷之前不会出现发烧或疼痛等急性症状，因此砷中毒被称为“无声的杀手”，造成了公共健康危机。水检测是减少和管理砷的关键，“你无法测量的，你就无法管理”这句格言是恰当的。目前的砷检测存在成本、准确度、精确度和可用性等问题，这些问题限制了缓解方案的有效性和范围。事实上，“现场测试”对于许多产品来说是一个误称，这些产品更像是需要训练有素的人员在现场进行微妙的化学反应的现场实验室。使用独特的专有酶，该项目创新性地修改了每年数十亿人生产的常见葡萄糖家庭测试中包含的技术，通过解决客户可用性，成本和精度要求。数以百万计的用户已经证明了葡萄糖测试的易用性;现在类似的技术可以用于改造砷测试。