Humans are generally exposed to a variety of
pollutions present in the air they breathe, the food they eat or in
the water they drink. Some of the most dangerous pollutions are
metals and heavy metals. These are naturally occurring
substances which are harmless when present in the environment
at low levels. However, due to many pollutants such as industry
processes or war activities, the heavy metal concentration can
exceed the limit of tolerance and become very toxic for the natural
environment and living organisms in it, including humans. Unlike
organic pollutants, the heavy metals (as ions and as particulate
matter) once introduced into the environment cannot be
biodegraded and remain there indefinitely. By rainfall these
pollutants can be partially transferred from air or soil into the
rivers and drinking water sources, where they accumulate in even
higher toxic levels. The high concentrations of heavy metals in
contaminated natural water reservoirs have an impact on the
microbial community composition which resides there. This type
of water pollution can cause the changes in life cycles of natural
bacterial populations, influencing their metabolic processes and
proliferation. The presence of pathogens in water is normally
indirectly determined by the testing for “indicator organism” such
as coliform bacteria. Coliforms are usually present in larger
numbers in contaminated water and at the same time they are
indicators of whether other pathogenic bacteria are present, too.
In crisis situations, like war or some natural disasters, where
trusted sources of drinking water are not available anymore, the
military and residents of affected areas are forced to use some
alternative water resources that cannot be tested for their
microbial or metal contamination properly. Therefore, the
existence of some fast test that would detect not only dangerous
bacterial pathogens in water, but also the presence of metals and
heavy metals as well, would be of great help and importance for
the human health. Even though the number of pathogens can be
drastically reduced by the boiling of water, the heavy metals are
not destroyed by high temperature. Hence the main objective of
our work was to optimize the biosensor chip for microbial detection in contaminated water that would serve at the same time
as an indicator for the chemical composition of the water, such as
presence of metals and heavy metals, with potential to be used as a
novel test tool in public health.
Assessment of the Sverdlovsk Oblast Drinking Water Pollution with Heavy Metal