Pilot studies with an apparatus for automatic bacteriological testing of water.

The data presented have demonstrated the applicability of monitored, automatic bacteriological testing of water from different sources. Information from experiment show a continuous variation in the number of polluting bacteria in water samples obtained from the same water source, thus indicating the necessity of using multiple samples in order to establish a "most probable contamination". When trying to determine the pollution of a certain water source, assay must be performed at different seasons of the year and under various climatic and weather conditions like heavy rain fall, drought and sub-zero temperatures. Working with sea water obtained from the same spot at sea, the degree of pollution in some samples appears to be influenced by changing wind and currents, high and low tide. The advantages of automatic sampling, inoculation and incubation on the spot are obvious. It is visualized that an industrial adapted modification of the prototype machine may serve wide variations of individual requirements pertinent to water assay.