Detection of Pathogens in Water using Micro and Nano-Technology

This book reports on some of the results and technologies of DINAMICS, through a number of chapters written by the project participants. Sabine Müller and Jonathan Loeffler (Steinbeis Europa Zentrum) give an overview of the European regulations for drinking water. Christian Mittermayr (Lambda, GmbH) describes the intricacy of microbiological risk assessment, the mathematical modelling that can turn analytical results in the input for decision making. Miloslava Prokšová and collaborators (at the Slovak Water Research Institute) tell about the sound procedures for water sampling. Christoph Zeis (Provenion Engineering) describes an automatic system for concentrating pathogens out of large volumes of water. Hunor Santha and co-workers (University of Technology and Economy of Budapest) illustrate their cell-lysis device. Theo Veenstra (LioniX, BV) zooms in on microfluidics devices designed to do wonders such as DNA extraction, on-chip PCR, mixers and valves, hybridization chambers with electrodes. Daniele Gazzola and co-workers (University of Bologna) review the characteristics of electrochemical biosensors and report on the type of such biosensor developed within DINAMICS. Alessandra Vinelli and collaborators (University of Bologna) reviews some of the modern nucleic acids technologies that can be used to enhance the signal coming from the recognition of pathogenic nucleic acids. Dimitris Mantzalis and collaborators provide an overview of water modelling approaches in both continuum and molecular framework. Nikolaos Asproulis discusses the various numerical techniques employed for simulating transport phenomena within micro- and nano-fluidic devices. To make the picture more complete, researchers who did not participate in DINAMICS were invited to contribute their views and their results. Many enriched this book. Sophie Courtois (Suez Environment) describes the process from water concentration to microarrays developed within the HealthyWater EU Project. Joseph Faulkinham (Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University) tell about quantitating Micobacteria. Vicente Catalan and co-workers (LabAqua) tells about new methods for the detection of Legionella. Johan Nordgren and co-workers (Linköping University) tell about how to detect viruses in water. Richard Christen and co-workers (Université de Nice) tells about how to design PCR primers to detect waterborne bacteria. Nikolai Priezjev provides fruitful insights on the boundary slippage in nanosclae liquid films. Theodoros Karakasidis and Antonios Liakopoulos discuss about the slip phenomena noticed within micro and nano-fluidic devices along with the contributing factors. Of course, the technology and knowledge described in this book alone is not enough to revolutionize the microbiological safety testing of drinking water. Still, the process has started and we would not be surprised if micro- and nanotechnology will soon lead the molecular detection of pathogens into a mature technology-driven field. In a similar way as chemical analysis takes full advantage of automation nowadays, our cities and homes might be protected in the future against waterborne infections. We trust we and the authors of this book gave our useful contribution.