{"id":21523,"date":"2017-08-03T14:18:39","date_gmt":"2017-08-03T18:18:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/?p=21523"},"modified":"2019-03-12T11:16:30","modified_gmt":"2019-03-12T15:16:30","slug":"university-of-virginia-water-purification-technology","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/university-of-virginia-water-purification-technology\/","title":{"rendered":"University of Virginia Public Benefit Company Makes Splash with Water Purification Technology"},"content":{"rendered":"

There has never been better a better time for advances in the area of water purification. As the crisis involving safe and drinkable water throughout many third world countries continues to prove problematic, many countries across the developed world are working to create innovative and new ways of solving this problem in as sustainable a way as possible. One such company has recently made significant strides in that direction.<\/span><\/p>\n

The University of Virginia in Charlottesville is the birthplace of MadiDrop PBC. Created two years ago as a public benefit company, it has successfully produced a ceramic tablet designed to purify any water it comes into contact with. Not quite like anything we have seen before, this little tablet was given a name inspired by the South African word for water, which is \u201cmadi.\u201d \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The MadiDrop was developed by <\/span>James (Jim) Smith<\/span><\/a>, professor of civil and environmental engineering at UVA, in his lab on the campus. It is possible for one MadiDrop to serve the drinking needs of one family for up to six months. In a <\/span>recent interview<\/span><\/a> by UVA Today, the technology behind it was described as \u201celegantly simple.\u201d When it comes into contact with water, the tablet releases silver ions at a rate that is well controlled. Smith described these ions as \u201can excellent disinfectant for waterborne pathogens\u201d in his interview. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI believe the technology is a disruptive one\u201d Smith told The University Network (TUN). <\/span><\/p>\n

There is not a comparable product on the market. The MadiDrop is highly effective water purification solution, but it also is remarkably easy to use and inexpensive.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

According to Smith, \u201cA $5 MadiDrop can treat up to 20 liters of water per day for 6-12 months.\u201d He adds that the company has already produced and sold over 20,000 MadiDrops \u201cthrough over 100 pilot studies in about 40 different countries.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

Currently, the MadiDrop is part of a study in a rural part of South Africa. Smith indicates that so far, further developments with the product are going well and the results have been satisfactory. \u201cI am in South Africa now and have just seen the latest water quality data,\u201d he told TUN. \u201cThe MadiDrop is performing extremely well and typically reduces coliform bacteria in household drinking water from thousands of colony-forming units per 100 milliliters to zero overnight. In fact, the MadiDrop is outperforming conventional silver-ceramic filters.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Given what the MadiDrop can accomplish, it is hardly surprising that Smith plans to continue spurring the growth of the company and sustainable technology it produces. \u201cThere really is a need for millions of MadiDrops\u201d he told TUN. \u201cWe hope to begin to fill that need in the coming years.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There has never been better a better time for advances in the area of water purification. As the crisis involving safe and drinkable water throughout many third world countries continues to prove problematic, many countries across the developed world are working to create innovative and new ways of solving this problem in as sustainable a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":35,"featured_media":21524,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[231,648,233,232,230,229,643,550,243],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21523","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-campus-news","category-clean-water","category-sustainable","category-technology","category-news","category-lead-stories","category-university-action","category-university-of-virginia-main-campus","category-health"],"aioseo_notices":[],"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/madidrop.jpg",830,533,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/madidrop-224x144.jpg",224,144,true],"medium":["https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/madidrop-300x193.jpg",300,193,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/madidrop.jpg",830,533,false],"large":["https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/madidrop.jpg",830,533,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/madidrop.jpg",830,533,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/madidrop.jpg",830,533,false]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"Samuel O'Brient","author_link":"https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/author\/samuel\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"There has never been better a better time for advances in the area of water purification. As the crisis involving safe and drinkable water throughout many third world countries continues to prove problematic, many countries across the developed world are working to create innovative and new ways of solving this problem in as sustainable a…","featured_media_src_url":"https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/madidrop.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21523","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/35"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21523"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21523\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21524"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21523"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21523"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21523"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}