Rapid testing for selected microbes in water samples

市政、商业和工业系统需要进行常规水采样，以确保水质不会受到潜在有害细菌(如大肠杆菌或大肠菌群)的影响。标准的采样和分析方法需要2至7天的时间才能收到结果，因此很难在出现问题时迅速进行干预。这个项目将建立在之前工作的基础上，这些工作导致了一种快速的水测试，可以在几分钟内检测到细菌。这项测试已经商业化，是一种有用的监测工具，但它测试的是细菌总数，而不是某些领域感兴趣的任何特定病原体。因此，该项目将扩展这一开发工作，以制定一种可用于特定细菌的测试策略，从大肠杆菌开始。我们的目标是开发一种相对快速的测试，可以在几个小时内得出结果，这样它就可以用于常规监测和故障排除目的，而标准测试仍然存在，用于监管和确认目的。这一合作项目将为商业测试开发的进行提供基本的科学和工程基础。随着机会的确定，将继续进行其他病原菌的测试开发。

Routine water sampling is required in municipal, commercial and industrial systems to ensure that the water quality is not compromised by potentially harmful bacteria such as E. coli or coliforms. Standard methods for sampling and analysis have a time delay of 2 to 7 days for results to be received, making it difficult to quickly intervene when problems arise. This project will build on previous work that led to the development of a rapid water test that could detect bacteria within a few minutes. This test has been commercialized and is a useful monitoring tool, but it tests for total bacteria and not any specific pathogens that are of interest in some fields. Therefore, this project will extend this development work to formulate a test strategy that can be used for specific bacteria, starting with E. coli. The goal will be to develop a relatively rapid test, that can give results within a few hours, such that it can be used for routine monitoring and troubleshooting purposes while the standard tests remain in place for regulatory and confirmation purposes.This collaborative project will provide the fundamental scientific and engineering basis for a commercial test development to proceed. Test development for other pathogenic bacteria will be pursued as opportunities are identified.