Moringa Tree Protein Identified For Water Cleansing

I have posted on the Maringa tree before this and here we have the development of a new protocol that uses the seed’s water cleaning effectiveness inexpensively and hopefully in a way people can easily apply.  I would like to see more and I am sure there is more to be done.

Yet this is an important tool that needs to be applied broadly.  Far too much water purification depends on infrastructure investment and is thus a blessing for most today but still leaving the residual population that needs clean water as a matter of health and advancing themselves.

Of course, the next twenty years of global development is likely able to solve this problem using infrastructure solutions.  Everybody knows that it can be solved.

In the meantime, taking advantage of this is a great interim solution.

Miracle tree substance produces clean drinking water inexpensively and sustainably

by Staff Writers

Washington DC (SPX) Jan 20, 2012

Past research showed that a protein in Moringa seeds can clean water. 

http://www.terradaily.com/reports/Miracle_tree_substance_produces_clean_drinking_water_inexpensively_and_sustainably_999.html

A natural substance obtained from seeds of the "miracle tree" could purify and clarify water inexpensively and sustainably in the developing world, where more than 1 billion people lack access to clean drinking water, scientists report.

Research on the potential of a sustainable water-treatment process requiring only tree seeds and sand appears in ACS' journal Langmuir.

Stephanie B. Velegol and colleagues explain that removing the disease-causing microbes and sediment from drinking water requires technology not always available in rural areas of developing countries.

For an alternative approach, Velegol looked to Moringa oleifera, also called the "miracle tree," a plant grown in equatorial regions for food, traditional medicine and biofuel.

Past research showed that a protein in Moringa seeds can clean water, but using the approach was too expensive and complicated. So Velegol's team sought to develop a simpler and less expensive way to utilize the seeds' power.

To do that, they added an extract of the seed containing the positively charged Moringa protein, which binds to sediment and kills microbes, to negatively charged sand.

The resulting "functionalized," or "f-sand," proved effective in killing harmful E. coli bacteria and removing sediment from water samples.

"The results open the possibility that ... f-sand can provide a simple, locally sustainable process for producing storable drinking water," the researchers say.