Journal of Bioengineering & Biomedical Science

Remote Biosurveillance System for Water Bodies

Abstract

Prakash K, Sanil KD, Dinesh N S and Chalapathi R

A biological weapon appears to be more threatening than any other type of weapon, due to the psychological impact it creates in a society. The easiness of manufacture, less controllability and the quantum of calamity, make this an attractive tool for many extremist groups. The water distribution systems either build by nature (such as river, lake etc) or humanly made ones (such as a metro water distribution system, canals etc) are susceptible to biological attack. Biological agents (BA) are effective in very low doses. Therefore, Biological Agent Detection Systems (BADS) need to exhibit high sensitivity. The complex and rapidly changing environmental background also requires these detection systems to exhibit a high degree of selectivity (i.e. Able to discriminate BA from other harmless biological and non-biological material present in the environment). In this paper we present a Remotely Accessible Bio Surveillance System (RABSS) that can sense presence of the BA such as Bacteria in remote water bodies. The system is capable of detecting the presence of bacteria in water bodies that contains a cell count greater than or equal to ten. The fully automated system includes, a Sample Handling System (SHS), Sensor module, Wireless communication link and an embedded system to control all the functionalities in real time.