By the year 2025, half of the global population could live in water-scarce areas. Quality loss of river water could lead to massive scarcity of drinking water.
Water is one of the most essential things we humans need to survive.
To be healthy and keep your body in good condition, we need access to a reliable supply of safe drinking water.
While we can go for weeks without eating, we will only survive for a few days without water.
One way to ensure that you always have clean water within reach is through water purification.
But, how could it be possible to purify a large amount of contaminated river water before we strike the threshold?
Could it be possible in near future?
The answer is yes. It’s happening.
Scientists at the University of Texas at Austin have created a hydrogel tablet that can purify adulterated or polluted river water and quickly transform it into drinkable.
Around one tablet of the hydrogel can purify a liter of river water in 60 minutes.
Guihua Yu is an associate professor at Cockrell School of Engineering.
He said,
“Our multifunctional hydrogel can make a big difference in mitigating global water scarcity because it is easy to use, highly efficient, and potentially scalable up to mass production”.
We all know that there are tons of ways to purify polluted water.
In our current modern world, There are many water treatment methods like Screening, Reverse Osmosis, Distillation, Fractional Distillation, Sedimentation, etc.
But apart from all of them, these hydrogel water treatment tablets are very effective and require zero energy.
Even at the initial stage of purification, usual water treatment methods take up more energy and time.
But here, in this case, hydrogel tablets require zero energy and much less time compared to others. And that’s the unique ability of hydrogel tablets.
How do Hydrogel Tablets work?
A hydrogel tablet can trigger out hydrogen peroxide that will neutralize poisonous and other bacterias at the success rate of around 99.999%. Hydrogen peroxide associated with carbon particles can attack vital cell components of bacterias and suspend their metabolism.
After the purification process, these hydrogels can easily be removed and it doesn’t create any harmful byproducts.
The findings of the research were published in the journal Advanced Materials.
Researchers say, It is inexpensive to make hydrogels and can be easily handled by any individual.
Soon it will be available in the markets.