Imagine a small box that can extract drinking water from the air, even in the Mojave Desert. This is just one of the amazing new technologies aimed at solving the global water crisis. That scale requires him to have sci-fi levels of innovation.
According to the United Nations, more than 2 billion people around the world do not have access to safe drinking water. Faced with natural water scarcity and drought amplified by climate change, many people have limited access to water, while others struggle with: contaminated water supply. Many people face both problems.
Imaginative tools and techniques are emerging for producing and purifying water. Scientists have created a microbial brain computer that detects toxicity, shocked lead with H2O, and built an energy-free purification device that resists human error.
These technologies will ultimately protect your health Thousands of people around the world are grappling with this problem, whether in cities with lead-contaminated water pipes or rural areas where communal wells can run dry.
One of the richest sources of water on earth is hidden in plain sight. It's air.
Less than 0.001 percent moisture in the atmosphere can provide 50 liters of water for each person on Earth, according to Omar M. Yagi, Ph.D., professor of chemistry and the James Tretter and Nieltje Tretter Professors at the University of California, Berkeley. That's what it means.
Goat's lab has developed a new way to harness this vast invisible resource.
They connect molecules together to create scaffold-like structures, with organic molecules acting as supports and metal atoms acting as joints. These metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) have vast surface areas. Two soccer fields have been folded into the size of a pea.
Goat's plexiglass water harvester is packed with MOF and can pull water from even the driest desert air. When exposed to sunlight, the box heats up and the MOF pulls moisture from the air, which is then released as ready-to-drink water.
“With the exception of MOFs, there is no other material in the world that absorbs and releases water like this at very low humidity,” says Yaghi.
With just 200 grams of MOF, the solar box can harvest more than 1 gallon of water per day.
In the electric version, the harvest and release cycle can be repeated throughout the day.
Microscopic single-celled organisms may hold the key to another problem: easily testing the safety of water.
Microbes have evolved to recognize and protect themselves from toxins in water that humans cannot taste or see, such as arsenic. Escherichia colilead.
„They have something like a genetic molecular brain that helps them do this,“ says Julius B. Lux, Ph.D., professor and associate professor in the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering at Northwestern University.
Microorganisms have biosensing proteins, also called biosensors. This is a process that attaches to toxins and activates specific genes, such as those that excrete lead from microorganisms.
The researchers discovered that they could extract a specific biosensor and rewire its DNA to produce a different gene, one that glows in the presence of pollutants.
They then edited and redesigned more biosensing proteins to respond to specific levels of pollution.
The final product is a handheld DNA computer, an array of test tubes containing freeze-dried proteins. The more contaminated the water sample, the more tubes will glow.
“Only when certain conditions are met will the final DNA molecules assemble to produce a fluorescent color,” Lux says. „It's kind of magical.“
Chlorine is a powerful tool for killing waterborne pathogens that cause disease, but it can be difficult to use effectively. Common methods such as chlorine tablets and knob dispensing devices leave a lot of room for human error.
Researchers at Tufts Environmental Research Institute wanted to make it easier to use chlorine in shared water sources in areas without electricity.
Their elegant solution has just two components: a small box that attaches to the end of a water pipe and a tank filled with liquid chlorine.
„Many of the health benefits that we've discovered by using treated water require that we always treat the water,“ said John, who was principal investigator on the device when he was at Tufts University and is currently an environmental scientist at the University of California. says Julie E. Powers, a doctoral student in engineering. Berkeley.
The box has a narrower diameter than the pipe, so when water flows through it, a pressure change occurs. This pressure change, known as the Venturi effect, draws chlorine from the tank into the water stream, where it is automatically treated without electricity.
The researchers installed Venturi devices at water points in seven communities in Bangladesh and Kenya, where access to clean water is often limited. After a six-month trial, five communities chose to purchase.
Appalled by the lead water crisis in Flint, Michigan, scientists and students at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology repurposed desalination technology to remove heavy metals.
They had already discovered a way to use electricity to separate impurities in water. The method, known as shock electrodialysis, can remove large amounts of sodium from seawater. But sodium is an essential component of drinking water, and its concentration is much lower, making it difficult to remove lead without removing everything else.
„Lead is a very difficult thing. If you try to filter it using electricity, it may play games with you and stick to the walls and surfaces of the system you are using.“ says Mohammad A. Al-Khadra, a doctoral candidate in the Department of Chemical Engineering. at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Their technology relies on electrically charged porous materials, such as microscopic pieces of glass trapped within the filter casing, like the activated carbon in Brita filters, and removes 95 percent of the lead.
These substances increase the conductivity of the water, moving sodium and metal ions, leaving a purified zone in their wake. Only pure water from that zone is supplied to the drinking water tank.
“I grew up appreciating water and recognizing its value,” says Al-Khadra, who grew up in water-scarce Saudi Arabia.
As more people face dwindling water supplies and pollution, many may need to embrace this idea.