M4D/MKLAB announces the kick off of PathoCERT project that aims to the timely and precise identification of pathogen contamination events in areas that water is present in order to inform the first responders and warn the public.
The project’s main mission is to ensure the quality of surface water. To this end, a unified solution will be adopted that combines (i) Remote sensing techniques applied on Satellite Data (ii) Artificial intelligence technologies paired with UAV material (iii) social media analysis on the most relative tweets (iv) early detection of threats to minimize any potential danger, detect incidents and most important to inform the first responders of any potential contaminations.
The contamination of water systems with pathogens is a major public health issue in both developing and developed countries across the globe. The pathogens affect negatively the human health vary between aquatic systems depending on the nature of the pathogen source and the intended use of the water. In poorly treated drinking water storages and recreational waters pathogen populations increase, posing a threat to human health, varying from gastrointestinal complains and skin rashes to more severe and life threatening conditions.
The partners in the EU project PathoCERT will develop a platform that combines novel technologies aiming to detect, localize and quantify waterborne contaminations. The idea is to utilize different types of Satellite sensors as well as Unmanned Vehicles (UxVs), and social media applications to enhance the situational awareness of first responders and the public.
The project has started in September 2020 and will last for three years. At the end of the project, there will be a prototype that could be developed into a product of the participating companies that are interested in bringing PathoCERT into the market as an innovative solution in waterborne pathogen identification and warning system. PathoCERT will be validated, tested and demonstrated on 5 pilots in Spain, the Netherlands, Cyprus, Greece and Bulgaria.
University of Cyprus (UCY) co-ordinates the project and M4D/MKLAB ITI CERTH is the risk manager and leads Work Package 5 on sensing technologies from UAVs, satellite images and social media data. PathoCERT has in general 23 partners (universities and companies) from 11 different countries.