Abstract
Drinking water utilities and researchers continue to rely on the century-old heterotrophic plate counts (HPC) method for routine assessment of general microbiological water quality. Bacterial cell counting with flow cytometry (FCM) is one of a number of alternative methods that challenge this status quo and provide an opportunity for improved water quality monitoring. After more than a decade of application in drinking water research, FCM methodology is optimised and established for routine application, supported by a considerable amount of data from multiple full-scale studies. Bacterial cell concentrations obtained by FCM enable quantification of the entire bacterial community instead of the minute fraction of cultivable bacteria detected with HPC (typically
Original language | English (US) |
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Pages (from-to) | 191-206 |
Number of pages | 16 |
Journal | Water Research |
Volume | 113 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - Feb 8 2017 |
Bibliographical note
KAUST Repository Item: Exported on 2020-10-01Acknowledgements: Sam van Nevel was supported by the project grant no. G.0808.10N and the travel grant V424114N of the FWO Flanders and the Inter-University Attraction Pole (IUAP) ‘μ-manager’ funded by the Belgian Science Policy (BELSPO, 305 P7/25); Emmanuelle Prest and Hans Vrouwenvelder were supported by funding from King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) and Evides Waterbedrijf; the Inter-University Attraction Pole (IUAP) ‘μ-manager’ funded by the Belgian Science Policy (BELSPO, 305 P7/25); Caitlin Proctor was supported by MERMAID, a Marie Sklodowska-Curie Initial Training Network, under grant number 607492. We thank Alina Nescerecka, the Kantonal Laboratory Zürich, Industrielle Werke Basel – Wasserlabor (IWB) and Pidpa for the shared data, Lisa Neu for literature support and Synthia Maes for the critical reading of the manuscript.