New technology for water filtration inspired by biology
There are many diseases linked to the quality of the drinking water we consume, and nowadays, many people in the world suffer from various problems due to the difficult access to drinking water, especially those who must resort to groundwater extraction.
In many regions, access to quality drinking water is difficult. Source: pxhere.com.
That is why a group of scientists at the Tufts University School of Engineering has developed a new filtering method to remove fluoride ions from water using polymeric membranes. By using this filtering system, the researchers claim they can avoid water toxicity due to elevated fluoride levels.
We have all heard of some of the benefits of fluoride consumption, especially for tooth care, which is why it is incorporated in small amounts in dental hygiene products, but few of us are aware that there is a very narrow threshold between the beneficial effects of this element and the adverse effects on health. According to the WHO, the optimum concentration of fluoride in water should be below 1 mg/L, the limit value being 1.5 mg/L, since with prolonged exposure above this value there is a risk of developing a disease known as fluorosis, which affects dental health or bone tissue, with its effects on bones being the most relevant.
And although we have intentionally added fluoride in toothpaste and drinking water, in some parts of the world high concentrations of fluoride occur naturally in groundwater, causing serious fluorosis in the population that has this water as its only resource, according to some evidence from the WHO skeletal fluorosis is a disabling disease affecting thousands of people in Africa, India and China.
That is why the ability to reduce the high concentration of fluoride in water in an economical way could protect communities that can only access water through wells in the affected communities, and the use of membranes with high ionic selectivity could provide a sustainable technical solution to the shortage of this resource in these populations, without having to resort to water demineralization or systems that only remove solutes by size difference and not by charge.
And this team of researchers was inspired by biological membranes to create a synthetic membrane capable of differentiating between the ions present in water, just as cell membranes have a high selectivity to allow the passage of certain ions into a cell, even regulating the concentration of ions and molecules inside cells with great precision. In an article published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, these researchers demonstrated that their membranes could separate fluoride ions among the various ions present in water.
Illustration of the membrane, nanochannels allow the passage of water and certain ions. Source: Image prepared in PowerPoint.
This group of researchers managed to develop a polymer with arrangements of positive and negative charges on a porous support, with which they created a membrane with very narrow channels, less than a nanometer in diameter, and due to the very small size of these pores, the ions present in the water are forced to interact with the molecular groups of the polymer, causing some of the ions to be repelled and others to pass much faster than others. In other words, the chemical composition of the polymer was made to orient the selectivity towards the fluoride ion, and by modifying the polymer composition the selectivity towards other ions could be changed.
Most current filtration systems separate molecules by preventing their size from passing through a given porous medium, i.e., they only limit their passage by the significant size difference, but are unable to retain single-atom ions because of their small size. In contrast, selective membranes such as this one would be able not only to filter large molecules but also to distinguish between ions due to their charge.
Hopefully, such membranes will be tested on a large scale to soon benefit regions whose only access to drinking water is through aquifers containing large amounts of fluoride, which has caused them serious health problems.
Thanks for coming by to read friends, I hope you liked the information. See you next time.
Hello @emiliomoron, After reading this, I have remembered that the water treatment plants in my city do not use the complete reagents and components necessary to treat the water, now I think that it is very possible that this is happening in my city, hypothetically we could be exposed to the consumption of water " raw "with excess fluoride.
Thanks a lot for this information.
Greetings friend @tocho2, depending on the origin of the water this could have more or less fluoride content, groundwater is the one that has the highest concentration, and the truth is that the purifiers are more concentrated in solids, pathogens and other ions easier to settle and remove, this ion is very difficult to remove by conventional methods.
Clean water is the basic requirement for a healthy life and yes many diseases are linked to the quality of the drinking water we consume. SO its very important to ensure that we drink clean and healthy water. Good to see that technology is evolving to filter the water while keeping it full of minerals and healthy.
useful blog
Greetings friend, no doubt, we need quality water to lead a healthy life, many alternatives have emerged filtering and with this we see that they are becoming more specific to improve their quality. Thanks for reading.
Water can be wonderful, but if it is not treated, it can also generate deep ills in the population... besides, certain practices tend to contaminate it... thanks for the information
Thank you very much to you for reading, and certainly water is a source of life but with bad conditions it is a means to transmit diseases to the population.
This new method of purifying water by using polymeric membrane is really a welcomed initiative. This will find practical application in places that have the challenge of good drinking water. I hope that research will be made further on this new technology and probably deployed to the places with lack of good water.
Nice piece buddy. Thanks for sharing
Thank you my friend. It is certainly a technology that will be well received, especially in regions that have access to this type of water with difficult to filter ions. Best regards!
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Thank you friends