AQUASCREEN - Biostability of water

• Projektnumber: WST3-F-5031298/001-2017/K3-W-47/007-2017
• Project management: Andreas Farnleitner, Karl Landsteiner University for Health Sciences / Department of Water Quality and Health
• Project partner(s): EVN Wasser GmbH, University of Natural Resources and Applied Life Sciences, Vienna / Institute of Bioanalytics and Agro-Metabolomics
• Project duration: 32 months from 01.09.2018

Background

The biostability of water (i.e. the ability to store and distribute it without impairing its quality) is a central criterion in drinking water supply. On the one hand, it is highly relevant for the suitability for consumption (e.g. bad taste/odour due to microbial metabolites) and on the other hand, it plays an important role for the health protection of the consumer (public health) (e.g. proliferation of opportunistic pathogens such as Pseudomonas aeruginosa). The determination of the biostability of water has so far only been solved inadequately from a technical point of view.
Due to the steady warming of our groundwater resources (on average 0.05 C° per year due to the effects of global warming) and the associated increased tendency for the growth of opportunistic pathogens, the improved analysis/predictability of the biostability of water plays an increasingly important role in the quality management of drinking water supplies.
In this project, a pioneering experimental investigation method based on state-of-the-art DNA sequencing methods for the sensitive detection of microorganisms and their population dynamics in the context of biostability testing of groundwater and drinking water is to be developed and evaluated. In addition, the possibility of coupling high-resolution DNA sequencing and chemical analysis will be investigated in order to make important biochemical processes in the water supply traceable. The focus of this project is on the development of new solution strategies for the investigation of drinking water resources that are important in Lower Austria (well water, groundwater, spring water). The investigation of the influence of disinfection processes, pipe materials or biofilms on the biostability of water is not directly the subject of AQUASCREEN. However, the method to be developed can of course be used to investigate these questions in the future.
Milestone 1: Established experimental procedure for determining and interpreting the multiplication and growth potential of waterborne bacterial populations in groundwater and drinking water on the basis of innovative flow cytometric analyses and DNA sequencing procedures ("basic module").
Milestone 2: Verification and presentation of the new possibilities on a case study of drinking water production and comparison with the traditional approach.
Milestone 3: Identification of the necessary development steps for coupling the basic module with high-resolution chemical analytics (add-on module "biogeochemistry") as well as recording/differentiating the spread & growth tendency of opportunistic pathogens (add-on module "facultative pathogens").
The research project is intended to take the problem of determining the biostability of groundwater and drinking water, which has so far been completely inadequately solved, to a new visionary approach and a holistic assessment/forecast. The results of this project also provide the direct scientific basis for the development of new investigation systems (prototypes) for tomorrow's practice.