Novel real-time monitoring and evaluation

To be able to react increasingly effectively to microbial contamination in the production of millions of tonnes of mineral slurries per year, and to optimise the biocide consumption costs, a method which measures directly the total viable count in real-time is urgently required. Such a method is nearing completion in its development. 

A combination of the Coulter-counter and fluorescence techniques has been investigated and developed in application to mineral slurries by the current authors and is now seen to offer a potential solution. 

With such a method the number of particles is counted and the volume determined in parallel. By staining the cells and determining the emitted fluoreseence, the physiologieal state of the individual eells ean be determined, so culture enrichment is no longer neeessary. Without the need for enrichment, the result is given in real-time. This methodology is just emerging in practical field trials for mineral slurry contamination control. 

Microbial cells challenged simultaneously with lipophilic and dimeric cyanin dye viable call non-viabis cell 

Dimeric cyanin dyes (i.e.ToPro3) only fluoresce in presence of nucleic acids (DNA/rRNA) and can oniy enter cells which lack a membrane charge i.e. the cell is non-viable. 

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