A Scalable Bio-based Solution to Eliminate Cyanotoxins in Drinking Water

人类面临的最大全球性挑战之一是获得可靠的安全饮用水。这在人类活动严重影响水质的发展中国家尤为严重。虽然地球被称为蓝色星球，71%的表面被水覆盖，但其中大部分是海水，不适合人类消费，工业应用或农业，这些都是社会经济发展所必需的。地球上只有一小部分水是淡水（约3%），但可供使用的水不到1%。这少量的可用水资源正处于紧张状态，联合国最近的一份报告预测，到2050年，由于气候变化、需求增加和污染，50亿人将面临水资源短缺。对水质和公众健康的一个严重威胁是，由于工业、农业和家庭废物的营养物污染（硝酸盐和磷酸盐），蓝藻（蓝绿藻）大量繁殖。蓝藻产生危险的毒素（蓝藻毒素），引起急性和慢性症状，导致死亡，最明显的是在巴西的卡鲁鲁，有超过71人死亡和癌症，包括中国记录的原发性肝癌。此外，人们担心这些毒素可能会导致亚洲国家（如斯里兰卡）不明原因慢性肾病（CKDu）病例的增加，在这些国家，蓝藻毒素可能是常年存在的。这些毒素非常稳定，不能通过典型的饮用水处理工艺甚至煮沸来去除，因此需要一种创新、简单和可持续的解决方案来去除它们。Pathmalal Manage教授（斯里兰卡Sri Jayewardenepura大学）与RGU阿伯丁工业生物技术研究所的Christine Edwards博士和Linda Lawton教授已经证明了微生物种群在安全消除水中这些毒素方面的有效性。他们发现，即使以前没有接触过特定毒素的天然微生物群落，也含有活性生物降解剂。降解是混杂的，这意味着，例如，暴露于肽将丰富微生物群，其联盟成员具有消除微囊藻毒素（七肽氰毒素）的能力。此外，有证据表明，一些天然存在的微生物可以主动杀死产毒素的蓝藻物种。该项目旨在利用和激发这种自然固定在生物炭上的微生物能力，提供一种可扩展的水处理系统，可用于斯里兰卡从农村水井到市政水处理设施的所有规模。开发生物炭将为优化微生物组提供低成本支持，并将利用英国生物炭研究中心（UEd）的Ondrej Masek博士的全球专业知识，在当地利用生物废物（例如椰子壳/壳、稻草）生产。为了确保水中不含有害浓度的蓝藻毒素，将开发一种简单的现场试剂盒，使用对多种毒素有反应的抗体，由Katrina Campbell博士（QUB）领导，该博士在开发针对多种毒素的创新诊断方面具有世界领先的专业知识。研究完成后，该项目将提供低成本、简单、可扩展、基于自然的水处理系统，用于消除常见的蓝藻毒素。此外，当地社区将受益于更好地利用农业废物生产生物炭，这种生物炭可用于广泛的应用，如肥料，此外还可以产生气体，因为它提供了一种替代能源。这种水处理解决方案将在许多发展中国家得到广泛应用，并将有助于实现联合国SG6，同时拥抱联合国世界水发展报告的理念，该报告强调“基于自然的水解决方案”的好处。

One of the greatest global challenges facing human-kind is access to reliable safe drinking water. This is particularly acute in developing countries where human activities significantly impact water quality. While the Earth is known as the blue planet with 71% of the surface covered by water, most of this is seawater and not suitable for human consumption, industrial applications or agriculture, all of which are essential for socioeconomic development. Only a tiny proportion of the Earth's water is freshwater (~3%) but <1% is available for use. This small amount of available water is under strain and a recent UN report predicted that 5 billion people could suffer water shortage by 2050 as a consequence of climate change, increased demand and pollution. One serious threat to water quality and public health is the occurrence of blooms of cyanobacteria (blue-green algae) as a result of nutrient pollution (nitrate and phosphate) from industry, agriculture and domestic waste. Cyanobacteria produce dangerous toxins (cyanotoxins) causing acute and chronic symptoms leading to fatalities, most notably in Caruaru, Brazil with over 71 fatalities and cancer humans, including primary liver cancer documented in China. In addition, there is concern that these toxins may be responsible for rising cases of chronic kidney disease of unknown origin (CKDu) in Asian countries such as Sri Lanka where cyanotoxins can be perennial. These toxins are very stable and not removed by typical drinking water treatment processes or even boiling, therefore an innovative, simple and sustainable solutions are needed for their removal. Professor Pathmalal Manage, (University of Sri Jayewardenepura, Sri Lanka) along with Dr Christine Edwards & Professor Linda Lawton (both of the Aberdeen Industrial Biotechnology Institute, RGU) have demonstrated the effectiveness of microbial populations for safe elimination of these toxins from water. They have found that natural microbial consortia, even with no previous exposure to specific toxins, contain active biodegraders. Degradation is promiscuous meaning that, for example, exposure to peptides will enrich the microbiome with consortia members with the ability to eliminate microcystins (heptapeptide cyanotoxins). Furthermore, there is evidence that some naturally occurring microbes can actively kill toxin-producing species of cyanobacteria. This project aims to harness and stimulate this microbial capability, naturally immobilised on biochar to provide a scalable water treatment system that can be used at all magnitudes from rural wells through to municipal water treatment facilities in Sri Lanka. The biochar will be developed to provide a low cost support for optimized microbiomes and will be produced locally from biogenic waste (e.g. coconut husks/shells, rice straw) exploiting the global expertise of Dr Ondrej Masek, of the UK Biochar Research Centre (UEd). Ensuring that water is rendered free from harmful concentrations of cyanotoxins a simple field kit will be developed using antibodies that react to multiple classes toxins, led by Dr Katrina Campbell (QUB) with world leading expertise on development of innovative diagnostics for a wide range of toxins. On completion of the research, the project will provide low cost, simple, scalable, nature-based water treatment systems for elimination of commonly occurring toxins from cyanobacteria. In addition, local communities will benefit from better use of agricultural waste to produce biochar which can be useful for a wide range of applications such as fertiliser with the added bonus of gas generation as it is produced providing an alternative energy source. This water treatment solution will have wide application in many developing countries and will contribute to achieving UN SG6 while embracing the philosophy of the United Nations World Water Development Report which emphasises the benefits of 'Nature-Based Solutions for Water.'