Mazen Saleh
Laurentian University, Ontario
Title: Towards in-line monitoring of coliforms in potable and recreational water
Biography
Biography: Mazen Saleh
Abstract
Coliforms remain to be a valuable indicator of fecal contamination of surface water. Communities counting on surface water as a source of drinking or potable water depend on the regular monitoring of the source water for the presence of potential pathogenic microorganisms. The same applies to recreational water as it also becomes a public health concern. There have been several developments in sensor technologies and testing methods during the past decade, including DNA-based tests, but the classical enzyme-based methods are robust and remain to be one of the best methods. Current testing in some communities still involves the regular manual collection of water samples for analysis of coliform presence in the laboratory. The availability of a small footprint benchtop unit that can do this testing can potentially pave the way to develop autonomous systems to perform and report real time on these tests or using in-line system integration.