Tag Archives: barometers

Tiny Protozoa May Hold Key to World Water Safety

Right now, it looks a little like one of those plastic containers you might fill with gasoline when your car has run dry. But Scott Gallager is not headed to the nearest Mobil station. The Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) biologist has other, grander plans for his revolutionary Swimming Behavioral Spectrophotometer (SBS), which employs one-celled protozoa to detect toxins in water sources.

Not only is he working on streamlining the boxy-looking contraption—eventually even evolving it into a computer chip—but he sees it as a tool to potentially  “monitor all the drinking water in the world.

“It has a unique utility.” (more…)

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