A smartphone attachment can detect low levels of mercury in water samples, opening the door to on-site, low-cost environmental monitoring.
Inorganic mercury is harmful to the kidneys, and can be converted by bacteria into its neurotoxic, organic forms. The device (pictured), developed by Aydogan Ozcan and his colleagues at the University of California, Los Angeles, can measure inorganic mercury at levels of 3.5 parts per billion (p.p.b.) — good enough to detect the maximum acceptable level of 6 p.p.b. advised by the World Health Organization. The attachment shines green and red light through tiny test tubes, which contain the water sample and a few reagents. The mobile phone's camera detects the light, which shifts towards green wavelengths if mercury is present. A custom-made app provides the measurement.
The researchers tested their device by creating a mercury-contamination map of 50 locations in California.
ACS Nano http://doi.org/q6n (2014)
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Phone device detects mercury. Nature 505, 589 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1038/505589a
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/505589a
