Our filtration system combines two water cleansing methods known as heat killing, and an ion-exchange process to produce clean water. The mechanical filter allows for common water contaminates such as lead, mercury, manganese, and arsenic to be removed, and the heat killing kettle system eliminates bacteria such as shigella, E. Coli, and campylobacter. These two procedures work well together for a point of care water cleaning device since they are both very common processes and very easy to use, and they are cost effective ways to clean water.
Our filtration system works in three stages. First the water is poured through the mechanical filter and into the kettle. Next, the kettle is switched on to let the water boil, removing any possible bacteria. We recommend letting the water reach a rolling boil for at least 10 minutes to kill all bacteria present. After this is done, the water can then be poured out and cooled to safely drink. Below is a video which shows the full process from start to finish on how the device works.
The device we've created is just a prototype. If the device were to be re designed and manufactured for real use in a house, a few things would need to change. First, there would only be one lid, which would contain the holes for the LAMP reaction, as well as a much smaller scale filter built into instead of the huge one we're using right now. Second, the kettle would have 2 layers and an arm to allow for users to touch the side of it without getting burnt, and to be able to grab the kettle. Thirdly, the heating plate would be able to monitor the temperature of the reaction on its own without the need for a human, and it would be able to turn the heat on and off on its own to keep the reaction at a steady 65 degrees Celsius. Lastly, the kettle would be scaled down entirely and designed to be a portable water bottle/filtration unit which could be used anywhere from outdoors to indoors, as long as there's a power source. Overall, we want to automate the device, and make it smaller and easier for users to operate.
