Monitoring of CyanoToxins in Southern Africa

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Safe drinking water is a scarce resource in many developing countries and cheap, reliable and low-tech methods for monitoring the water quality are almost non-existent. The project will focus on the development of cost-effective and reliable methods for the detection and monitoring of cyanotoxins. The project involves collaboration between researchers from four Norwegian institutes and three countries in Southern Africa, including training of a Norwegian PhD student who will also spend time in Southern A frica. The project complements an existing NUFU collaborative project on environmental toxicology of cyanotoxins involving some of the partners. A novel immunoassay for the microcystin group of cyanotoxins will be developed. The assay, along with a range of existing bioassay methods, will be validated against LC-MS using certified standards. The methods will also be evaluated for reliability, ruggedness, cost-effectiveness, and suitability for use under Southern African conditions. Appropriate methods wi ll be trialled on a range of environmental samples from water bodies and wildlife from the region. In addition, a new passive sampling method for time-averaged measurement of cyanotoxins in water bodies will be tested and validated. Data from environmenta l samples will be collated in a GIS epidemiological database, and made publicly available. Research results will be published in open access formats so as to be readily available to scientists in developing countries. In addition, relevant information wi ll be presented in a form which is accessible for journalists and the general public on the participating institutions' web pages.