Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in water pose a serious threat to human health due to their toxic effects. This manuscript evaluates various drinking water treatment processes to remove these compounds from drinking water, in order to assure the quality of water intended for human consumption.
Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) represent a family of emerging persistent organic pollutants. Cost-effective remediation of PFAS contamination via chemical or biochemical degradation is challenging due to their extremely high stability. This study reports the removal of two representative PFAS species, perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and perfluorooctanesulfonic acid (PFOS), from water by adsorption using aluminum-based water treatment residuals (Al-WTR), a non-hazardous waste generated during the process of drinking water treatment by alum salts.
In this review, the authors discuss the drivers, fundamental science, and potential enabling materials for high selectivity membranes, as well as their applications in different water treatment processes.
Produced water (PW) is the main waste stream generated from oil and gas extraction. Nowadays, half of the global PW volume is managed through environmentally controversial and expensive disposal practices, such as re-injection through deep wells. In dry areas such as in the Arabian Peninsula, PW could be reused to irrigate crops, creating environmental, economic and social value. However, the quality of most PWs remains challenging as their high salinity, sodicity and alkalinity can degrade soil fertility and crop yield.
In this study, the authors investigate the effect of phosphate functionalisation on the removal of uranyl ions from mine-drainage contaminated water.
Early and accurate anomaly detection in critical infrastructure (CI), such as water treatment plants and electric power grid, is necessary to avoid plant damage and service disruption. Several machine learning techniques have been employed for the design of an effective anomaly detector in such systems. However, threats such as from insiders and state actors, introduce challenges in the design of an effective anomaly detector. This work presents a multi-layer perceptron (MLP) based anomaly detector that uses an unsupervised approach to safeguard CI from the adverse impacts of cyber-attacks.
Reaching the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 6 on water and sanitation is fundamentally important and conditional to the achievement of all the other SDGs. Nonetheless, achieving this goal by 2030 is challenging, especially in the Global South. Science lies at the root of sustainable development and is a key to new solutions for addressing SDG 6. However, SDG 6-related scientific outputs are often unknown, forming disconnections between academic world and practitioners implementing solutions.
Chitin is the structural material of crustaceans, insects, and fungi, and is the second most abundant biopolymer after cellulose on earth. Chitosan, a deacetylated derivative of chitin, can be obtained by deacetylation of chitin. It is a functionally versatile biopolymer due to the presence of amino groups responsible for the various properties of the polymer. Although it has been used for various industrial applications, the recent one is its use as a biodegradable antimicrobial food packaging material.
This study supports SDGs 3 and 6 by identifying passive chlorination at the point of collection as an effective and scalable strategy for reducing diarrhoea in children and improving access to safe and affordable drinking water in a low-income urban setting.
As emerging contaminants, antibiotic resistance genes (ARGs) have become a public concern. This study aimed to investigate the occurrence and diversity of ARGs, and variation in the composition of bacterial communities in source water, drinking water treatment plants, and tap water in the Pearl River Delta region, South China. Various ARGs were present in the different types of water. Among the 27 target ARGs, floR and sul1 dominated in source water from three large rivers in the region.
