Tec laboratory looking for COVID in wastewater wins LATAM prize

Tec de Monterrey’s Wastewater Monitoring Project (MARTEC) has won in the Latin American Water Projects category at the Aquatech LATAM Awards 2021.

The award was presented on September 7 in Mexico City at the Aqua Tech Mexico conference, which is a platform for companies working in the water technology industry.

“The MARTEC family is proud to be recognized for the effort we’re making to tackle the pandemic, which is to provide peace of mind to the Tec community,” said Dr. Roberto Parra, leader of the MARTEC project.

“It’s an honor to receive this type of award, which is given to institutions that work with water in Latin America, and which have had an international impact,” said Dr. Eduardo Sosa, co-founder of the project.

MARTEC is part of the Tec’s Conscious Return strategy. It focuses on detecting COVID-19 outbreaks early, through wastewater sampling which looks for genetic material from the SARS-CoV-2 virus.

Wastewater reveals population’s health

Using the Reverse Transcription-Polymerase Chain Reaction (RT-PCR) technique, MARTEC monitors for the presence of the ribonucleic acid (RNA) of the virus that causes COVID in water samples taken at Tec facilities.

“We let everyone know when we detect viral particles in a building’s wastewater. All the people who were in that facility can then be contacted,” said laboratory coordinator Dr. Mariel Oyervidez.

The researcher explained the importance of using wastewater to get this information and how the laboratory has applied this technology as a result of the situations caused by the pandemic.

“It’s important to monitor the water because we can learn a lot about the state of a city or an entire population without being invasive, which is one of the issues with nasal samples, for example.

“The technology allows us to analyze the biological status of a whole city, an entire urban metabolism, to prevent pandemics. We can monitor diseases, pathogens, other viruses, other bacteria and even drug use,” she said.

“Every time we take samples, we can see how much progress we’re making in this pandemic” - Dr. Eduardo Sosa

Providing prompt information for decision making

Since the beginning, the project has evolved and is even capable of detecting new variants of the virus using faster processes and with lower costs, explained Dr. Oyervidez.

Dr. Sosa pointed out that the laboratory has provided prompt information, even about new variants.

“We’ve seen that development of the infection can be as fast as 4 days with the new variants, but I think we’ve been quite successful in using even that time to be able to provide information to decision-makers,” shared Dr. Sosa.

The laboratory is supported by the Tec and the FEMSA Foundation, as well as other organizations such as Monterrey Water and Drainage Services. It has also collaborated with Arizona State University (ASU).

Today, the MARTEC laboratory serves all Tec campuses and other institutional facilities at a total of 37 locations, as well as the Monterrey metropolitan area where it monitors more than 5.5 million people.

“Every time we take samples, we can see how much progress we’re making in this pandemic,” said Dr. Sosa.

Dr. Oyervidez said that as more people return to Tec campuses and the population that has to be covered grows, the challenge of maintaining traceability increases.

“As the number of people increases, it’s more difficult to know who’s infected and who could cause a future outbreak. Breaking the chain of infection depends on our work and follow-up by TecSalud medical services,” she said.

“The project has great potential because it’s helped a lot with preventing outbreaks on campuses and monitoring the pandemic.” - Dra. Mariel Oyervidez

Extending to detect other diseases

In addition to the SARS-CoV-2 virus and its different variants, Dr. Sosa said that the MARTEC laboratory is opening lines of research to be able to detect other pathogens in wastewater.

“There’s an option to continue evaluating endemic viruses such as Zika, Chikungunya, and Dengue. We’d also like to include Chagas, another Latin American disease that is moving north as a result of climate change,” said Dr. Sosa.

He also said that MARTEC recently began to working with the UNAM, the National Polytechnic Institute (IPN), and the Mexico City Water System (SACMEX), to start monitoring in Mexico City as it does in Monterrey and its surrounding area.

“We’re also working hard to make a MARTEC spin-off, to advance as a technology-based company using our knowledge and technology to be able to apply our technology to other institutions,” he added.

“Knowing that our project was selected as the Latin America winner and receiving this award as part of the Tec community fills us with great pride.” - Dr. Mariel Oyervidez

The Aquatech LATAM Awards

The annual Aquatech LATAM Awards recognizes the institutions and organizations that use and innovate with water technology in Latin America. 

In this, its third year, it handed out awards in two categories: Projects and Innovation in Services, Solutions and/or Products.

The criteria evaluated include originality, practicality (technical, economic, and feasible), and sustainability, as well as how many people it benefits. 

“Knowing that our project was selected as the Latin America winner and receiving this award as part of the Tec community fills us with great pride,” said Dr. Mariel Oyervidez.

“This project has great potential because it’s helped a lot with preventing outbreaks on campuses and monitoring the pandemic,” added Dr. Parra.

The Aquatech Mexico 2021 conference, where the award was presented, took place in Mexico City from September 7 to 9.

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