LONDON: The next time you want to get clean water, all you need to do is tear a page from your very own “drinkable super book”.
Scientists have created pages which are impregnated with bacteria-killing metal nanoparticles – a highly inexpensive, simple and easily transportable nanotechnology-based method to purify drinking water. Printed on each page is information on water safety, both in English and the language spoken by those living where the filter is to be used. Each page can be removed from the book and slid into a special holding device in which water is poured through and filtered.
A page can clean up to 26 gallons (100 litres) of drinking water; a book can filter one person’s water needs for four years. The discovery was made by Theresa Dankovich while studying the material properties of paper.
She says that even with highly contaminated water sources, the super book with silver and copper-nanoparticle paper can achieve 99.9% percent purity, bringing bacteria levels comparable to those of the drinking water in America.
She also confirmed that some silver and copper will leach from the nanoparticle-coated paper, but the amount lost into the water is within minimal values and well below Environmental Protection Agency and World Health Organization drinking water limits for metals.
One in every 10 diseases and 6% of all deaths globally are caused by unsafe water and improper hygiene.
In India for example, over a crore people die annually of which, nearly 7.5% – 7.8 lakh deaths – are related to water, sanitation and hygiene.
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