How water innovation research at U of T Engineering is improving health

Mar 21, 2022

A low building with a solar panel on the roof sits next to a large round concrete structure in a garden. — Kharumwa Health Centre in northern Tanzania uses a rainwater harvesting facility: the tank can be seen behind the main building while the solar panel used to power the UV treatment unit is on the roof. Photo by Karlye Wong

Water innovation research at U of T’s Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering benefits from a generous gift from alumnus Henry Wu (BASc 1975, MASc 1979). His 2015 donation for the Dr. Woo Hon Fai Innovation Floor in the Myhal Centre for Engineering Innovation and Entrepreneurship made a state-of-the-art home for the University of Toronto’s Institute for Water Innovation.

“I care about water sustainability,” explained Wu at the time. “I have visited the remote mountainous regions in China to help them out, and I have experienced first-hand how difficult it is for them to access water. U of T is doing a great thing, and I’m happy to support water innovation research.”

For World Water Day, we celebrate two innovative projects by U of T engineers. Both leverage the power of science to improve health outcomes—in two very different ways.

Solar-powered UV water treatment could improve health outcomes in rural Tanzania

U of T Engineering PhD candidate Karlye Wong (MASc 2016) is working with the Geita and Nyanghwale District Councils in northern Tanzania to develop an affordable, low-maintenance, off-grid solution for delivering clean drinking water — one that could significantly improve local health outcomes.

“Lack of access to safe water exacerbates risks of infection, water-borne diseases and diarrhea,” says Wong, who is supervised by Professor Ron Hofmann (MASc 1996, PhD 2000). “In Tanzania, a study by the National Institute for Medical Research showed that 60 per cent of health-care facilities have high degrees of unsafe microbial contamination in sample water.”

One potential solution is treating harvested rainwater with ultraviolet (UV) light, which is known to destroy pathogens such as viruses and bacteria. Powered by low-cost solar panels, off-grid UV treatment systems are simpler to deploy and require less maintenance than traditional chemical treatment.

As part of a pilot program, eight health-care facilities in the Geita and Nyanghwale District Councils have been outfitted with solar-powered UV systems for rainwater harvesting and disinfection. Wong and her collaborators are now leading a detailed assessment of the performance of these facilities, as well as the experiences of their operators.

“While this work focuses on a pilot study in Tanzania, the lessons learned will be broadly applicable to rural or off-grid communities in developing countries around the world,” says Wong.

“Working closely with local government and staff allows us to integrate community needs and long-term sustainability into this research. It’s really important that we get these details right, because there are so many places where this kind of approach could make a difference.”

It’s really important that we get the details right, because there are so many places where this kind of approach could make a difference.

Tracking community transmission: Researchers advance COVID-19 variant detection in GTA wastewater

As Ontario continues its gradual easing of COVID-19 public health measures, continued vigilance is necessary for governments to manage the virus in the long-term. A team including members of U of T Engineering’s BioZone is helping to improve alternative monitoring strategies.

One important and cost-effective tool that can help track trends in community transmission, and detect new variants of concern, is wastewater surveillance.

“One huge advantage of wastewater monitoring is everyone must use a toilet, so we are able to capture data for both symptomatic and asymptomatic infections,” says Dr. Minqing (Ivy) Yang (BASc 2005, MASc 2008, PhD 2015), a research associate in the BioZone lab and a member of its SARS-CoV-2 wastewater surveillance team.

“Our results don’t depend on an individual’s actions,” Yang adds, “whether a sick person is going to do a clinical test or not. Overall, we are monitoring wastewater data from 2.7 million people in the Greater Toronto Area, which is about 18 per cent of Ontario’s population.”

“We were able to successfully track the Alpha wave last spring, as well as the Delta wave late last summer, and the recent Omicron wave in late December to early January,” Yang adds.

The BioZone lab receives 24-hour composite wastewater samples from the nine sites three times a week. Once it’s concentrated by a technician, RNA is extracted from the sample. Research associates will then conduct a one-step reverse transcription qPCR analysis on the extracts to quantify levels at which the SARS-CoV-2 virus is present.

The technique is the same as a clinical PCR test, only the sample — solids extracted from wastewater — is different.

Within a 48-hour window, the team uploads its data to the MECP’s data hub, where the lab’s partners, Toronto Public Health and Halton Public Health, can access it to inform their public health decisions. Since January 2022, the public health units have made this data publicly available.

Nine people stand together on a rooftop. The CN Tower is visible behind them.

Advancing the early detection of variants of concern is also a top priority for the lab. Peng and Edwards have developed a mass spectrometry method, which the team believes is the first to be used in the SARS-CoV-2 wastewater surveillance field.

“This method is very powerful in helping us discriminate the variants, even if their sequences are very similar,” says Peng. “We can even use mass spectrometry to discriminate the difference when there is only one single-base mutation on the sequence.”

With files from the Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering