Not Your Ordinary Book: This Drinkable Book Filters Water and Saves Lives

Water is one of the most important resources we need for our survival. A person can survive for at least three weeks without food, but can only last for a week without water – and that estimate even depends on the environment; It can be shorter than a week in harsh environments.

Although 70% of the earth is covered by water, we still face a water crisis, since an overwhelming proportion of the earth’s water is saline – hence not potable. Only 2.5% of the earth’s water is fresh, with a minute 1% of it accessible to us. Millions of people across the globe suffer from having no access to safe drinking water, which in turn increases the morbidity and mortality due to water-borne diseases. Majority of these water-related problems can be traced back to lack of access and pollution of water sources and in order to address these issues, waste water treatment plants and water lines need to be constructed, which may not be feasible in many poverty-stricken and geographically isolated areas where these are needed most.

This is precisely why this innovative technology created by Dr. Theresa Dankovich is a lifesaver. Dr. Dankovich, a postgraduate researcher at Carnegie Mellon University, invented the Drinkable Book. This is no ordinary book, mind you – the book contains information about water safety and at the same time can be used as a filter for water purification. Each page of The Drinkable Book contains antibacterial silver nanoparticle paper filters, which can filter 99.9% of biological contaminants out of dirty water.

Dr. Theresa Dankovich creates each page of the Drinkable Book herself…

…and each page of The Drinkable Book can be used to filter dirty water

When you finish reading the book, you can tear a page off and use it to filter drinking water

Just place a page in the plastic holder…

…then pour the water you want to purify

Dr. Dankovich successfully conducted field trials of the book in Ghana, Haiti, and Kenya in partnership with Water is Life Organization. The book is currently not yet commercially available and additional funds are still needed for the project to reach the market. As such, they have launched a campaign in order to fund additional trials and production of more drinkable books, and if you want to contribute to the cause, you can visit their page here. Hopefully, this wonderful innovation can help provide safe drinking water to many communities across the globe.

For more details, watch the video below:

What do you think about this invention? Share your thoughts in the comments section and don’t forget to share this post with your friends.

Source: pAge Drinking Paper/LinkedIn/Theresa DankovichThe Daily Good