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

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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