Development of a pulsed light approach as a novel solution in drinking water treatment / Dr. Mary Garvey and Prof. Neil Rowan

Project Partners iii Executive Summary vii 1 Introduction 1 1.1 Cryptosporidium 1 1.2 Giardia 2 1.3 Waterborne Transmission of Parasite Species 2 1.4 Water Policy 3 1.5 Ultraviolet Light 4 1.6 Chlorine Reduction through UV Reactors 7 2 Methods 8 2.1 Parasite Test Species 8 2.2 Mammalian Cell Culture and Maintenance of Cell Lines 9 2.3 Viability and Infectivity Determination of Parasite Species 9 2.4 Pulsing of Parasites Samples with UV Rich Light 9 2.5 Combined Cell Culture-quantitative PCR (CC-qPCR) Assay for Enumerating Viable Parasite Species Post-treatments 10 2.6 Preparation and Pulsed UV Treatment of Planktonic Bacterial Cells 11 2.7 Preparation of Bacillus Species Endospores 11 2.8 Pulsed UV Inactivation of Bacillus Endospores 11 2.9 Comparative Low-pressure UV Inactivation of Test Species 12 2.10 Biofilm Studies 12 2.11 Flow-through Pulsed UV Inactivation Studies 13 2.12 Ecotoxicological Testing of Pulsed UV Treated Water 14 2.13 Statistical Analysis 16 3 Results 17 3.1 Development of a Cell Culture Assay for Parasite Infectivity 17 3.2 Quantitative PCR for Determination of Parasite Infectivity 19 3.3 UV Inactivation of Parasite Test Species 20 3.4 UV Inactivation of Planktonic Vegetative Cells 22 3.5 Pulsed UV Inactivation of Bacillus Endospores 27 3.6 Pulsed UV Inactivation of Microbial Biofilms 28 3.7 Ecotoxicological Assessment 31 3.8 Flow-through PUV Inactivation Studies 32 vi 4 Discussion 37 4.1 Cell Culture PCR for Parasite Viability (CC-PCR) 37 4.2 Treatment of Parasite Species 38 4.3 Ecotoxicology Testing of Treated Water 39 4.4 Pulsed UV Inactivation of Bacterial Biofilms 40 4.5 Inactivation of Bacillus Endospores 40 5 Conclusion 42 5.1 Deductions 43 5.2 Recommendations 43 References 44