Water supply innovation wins national prize

Flinders Honours student Sarah Aucote was awarded the 2018 AWA National Student Water Prize at the Ozwater18 international water conference in Brisbane on 9 May 2018.

Ms Aucote won the award for her Honours project, Smart Monitoring for Microbial Risk Assessment, which is investigating a new approach to track sources of faecal contamination in water supply systems.

This national accolade comes after Ms Aucote won the Hodgson Medal (The Student Water Award) for her Honours work at the SA Australian Water Association Awards in November last year – see previous Flinders news article.

Her research has the potential to decrease the cost of performing microbial risk assessments, leading to widespread improvements in monitoring and risk management of water supplies. The process, which will involve examining assays targeting mitochondrial DNA, will ultimately improve Health Based Target compliance, particularly in regional areas.

Matthew Flinders Distinguished Professor of Hydrogeology Craig Simmons, the director of the National Centre for Groundwater Research and Training at Flinders, says Sarah’s project provides important research for the continual improvement in providing safe water via new and existing supply systems.

 

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