The concentration of cell-culture-adapted hepatitis A virus (HAV) from experimentally contaminated distilled, drinking, waste and seawater was performed by using a filter adsorption-elu-tion method in the following conditions: HAV seeded in water was adsorbed at pH 4.0 to two nitrocellulose membranes (1.2 and 0.45 µm porosity for distilled and tap water or 8.0 and 3.0 µm porosity for waste and seawater), then eluted by 3% beef-extract at pH 8.5 and further concentrated by polyethylene glycol 6000 precipitation. Thus, HAV in 5 to 50 liters of seeded waters was concentrated approximately 1,700 to 17,000 fold with greater than 70% recovery of the initial virus added to the samples.
