South Africa is a water-scarce country due to the shortage of rainfall. This scarcity is further exacerbated by the loss of water through leakage from faulty pipes. This paper reports on the use of a simple microfluidic device in the early detection of water leakages. The microfluidic paper-based device μPADs) were prepared by printing patterns of wax (100 μm width) on the paper surface and melting the wax into the paper to form hydrophobic barriers. Solutions of lower to higher pH were also prepared and were introduced to the chlorophenol red test strips and a range of colours from yellow (lower pH) to purple (higher pH) were obtained. The digital images obtained with the μPADs were analysed using the CIELab colour system. The optimized pH range was wider than the typical grayscale-based image analysis and was successful for a wide pH range of 2-12. The QR codes attached to the strips enable tracking to obtain the real-time location from which leakage was detected. The study conclusively shows that the combination of digital image analysis and a μPAD device is highly efficient for quantitative analysis, and thus useful for the detection of household water leaks.

Abstract To synthesize Nano eggshell-titanium-dioxide (EB@TiO2) biocomposite and to evaluate its effectiveness in occluding opened dentine tubules. EB@TiO2 was synthesized and characterized using X-ray diffraction (XRD), and Transmission Electron Microscope (TEM). Sixteen simulated bovine dentine discs were prepared and randomly assigned into four groups according to the following treatment (n = 4): Group 1: No treatment; Group 2: eggshell powder; Group 3: EB@TiO2; Group 4: Sensodyne. These were then agitated in a solution of 1g powder and 40mL water for 3hours. Thereafter, each dentine discs from the respective groups were post-treated for 5 min with 2wt% citric acid to test their acid resistant characteristics. Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) was used to observe the effectiveness of occluded dentine pre-and post-treatment. The cytotoxicity of the synthesized EB@TiO2 was tested using NIH 3T3 assay. ANOVA was used to evaluate the mean values of the occluded area ratio and the data of MTS assay. This was followed by a multi-comparison test with Bonferroni correction (α = .05). The XRD confirmed that EB@TiO2 was successfully modified through ball-milling. The TEM revealed the presence of both spherical and irregular particle shape powders. The SEM result showed that EB@TiO2 could effectively occlude open dentine tubules. Equally, the result demonstrated that EB@TiO2 exhibited the highest acid resistant stability post-treatment. NIH 3T3 assay identified that EB@TiO2 had little effect on the NIH 3T3 cell line even at the highest concentration of 100µg/ml. This study suggests that the application of EB@TiO2 effectively occluded dentine tubules and the occlusion showed a high acid resistant stability.

A molecularly imprinted polymer (MIP) that is selective to ketoprofen was synthesized and applied in the adsorption of the target compound from water. The MIP was synthesized using a bulk polymerization method at high temperatures (60-80°C), where ketoprofen, 2-vinylpyridine, ethylene glycol dimethacrylate, toluene and 1,1´-azobis(cyclohexanecarbonitrile) were used as template, functional monomer, cross-linker, porogen and initiator, respectively. Non-imprinted polymer (NIP) was synthesized similarly to the MIP but in the absence of ketoprofen. From molecular dynamics simulation, the nature of interactions that occurred between the template and the functional monomer were found to be based on hydrogen bonding. This was confirmed experimentally, where a high extraction efficiency of ≥ 90% was obtained at acidic conditions (pH 5) due to the protonation of ketoprofen. A contact time of 45 min was sufficient for the maximum adsorption of ketoprofen from 10 mL spiked water using 8 mg of the adsorbent. MIP showed greater selectivity than NIP by achieving a relative selectivity coefficient of 7.7 towards ketoprofen in the presence of structurally related pharmaceuticals. Furthermore, the order of sorption onto the MIPs from water was ketoprofen > fenoprofen > gemfibrozil. From a modelling perspective, the Langmuir adsorption isotherm and pseudo-second-order kinetic model gave the best fit, with maximum adsorption capacity of 8.24 mg·g−¹ and sorption rate constant of 0.25 mg·g−¹·min−¹ for MIP. This was translated to chemisorption of ketoprofen onto the homogeneous MIP binding sites. This work demonstrated the great potential of MIP in selective recognition of ketoprofen from wastewater relative to closely related compounds.