Aquaya's Q-H₂O project is adapting the proven technology of antimicrobial surface coatings to create new products for household-level drinking-water-treatment. This revolutionary approach promises products that are extremely low-cost, easy-to-use, highly effective, and designed to local user preferences.

Aquaya is working with coatings of quaternary ammonium silane (QAS), chemicals that were first developed in 1972 and are currently used in a variety of consumer and medical products. QAS coatings are stable, inexpensive, and highly-effective against many microbial pathogens. Aquaya's Q-H₂O project will adapt this existing technology to address water disinfection needs, investigating products that employ QAS coatings on water storage containers, container inserts for water disinfection, and water filtration units.

The Q-H₂O technology offers substantial potential benefits for household-level water treatment, providing the efficacy of chemical disinfection without unappealing taste and smell, and the ease-of-use of ceramic filtration without the associated cost. Furthermore, because QAS coatings can be applied to many different materials, product designs can easily be tailored to local user preferences and needs.

Aquaya's Q-H₂O project combines laboratory research with on-the-ground assessment work to evaluate prototypes in the field and to field-test final designs. Successful field testing will be followed by a commercialization effort in which we identify local and regional partners to take on manufacturing and distribution.