Student sheds light on water invention

MAARTEN HOLL/Fairfax NZ

Eldon Tate will use his AMP scholarship win to develop a cheap water-purification method powered by sunlight.

The lives of almost 800 million people without access to clean drinking water could change, thanks to a $10,000 prize for Wellington PhD student Eldon Tate.

The Victoria University student was one of 15 people to win an AMP scholarship or prize at the Do Your Thing awards ceremony last night.

A nanotech researcher, Tate has already developed tiny molecules that, in the lab at least, have shown they can purify water.

"These nanoparticles are anti-bacterial and they also use the sunlight to break down organic contaminants," Tate said.

"We're not really filtering it, we're using the energy from the sun to break down all the bad stuff in it."

The idea of harnessing the power of sunlight to purify water in developing nations is not a new one but, so far, no-one has cracked the magic formula of an efficient and yet inexpensive system, Tate says.

"One of the problems with the materials they're using at the moment is that they can only use high-intensity UV light but we have [nanoparticles] that use visible light which makes them much more efficient and can be used on cloudy days," he said.

"And one of the good things about them is that you don't have to use a lot of them they're highly reactive."

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Student sheds light on water invention