Study Finds Nanotrap Particles Cut Wastewater Surveillance Equipment Costs

29 October 2026. A study led by researchers at Imperial College London, in collaboration with international public health institutions, evaluated methods for improving the sensitivity and cost-effectiveness of wastewater surveillance for multiple infectious diseases. The work compared five wastewater concentration methods and five nucleic acid extraction kits. Ceres Nanosciences' Nanotrap Microbiome A Particles showed the most consistent recovery across structurally diverse pathogens and the lowest equipment cost of the five concentration methods.

The findings were published in VeriXiv on October 2, 2026 (volume 3, article 299). The study focused on pathogens associated with polio, typhoid fever, cholera and hepatitis E, with additional evaluation of SARS-CoV-2 and other viral indicators.

The Nanotrap workflow required approximately $8,200 in equipment, compared with approximately $15,700 to $23,400 for competing methods. Concentration took approximately 1.5 to 2 hours. The five technologies compared were Nanotrap particles, skimmed milk flocculation, polyethylene glycol precipitation, ultrafiltration and electronegative filtration.

Nanotrap particles significantly outperformed polyethylene glycol precipitation for recovery of naturally occurring SARS-CoV-2 in wastewater. For Vibrio campbellii, a surrogate for the cholera pathogen Vibrio cholerae, Nanotrap significantly outperformed polyethylene glycol precipitation both before and after PCR inhibitor removal. Nanotrap also enabled endpoint PCR detection in all three spiked samples without additional inhibitor removal. Nanotrap A Particles alone performed comparably to a combined Nanotrap A and B particle workflow.

The researchers identified a workflow combining Nanotrap particles, MagMAX Wastewater nucleic acid extraction and PCR inhibitor removal as the preferred approach for simultaneous multi-pathogen detection under the study conditions. Skimmed milk flocculation offered the lowest consumable cost per sample.

Samples were collected from a municipal treatment facility serving approximately 2.1 million people in London. The study noted that wastewater composition, pathogen characteristics and laboratory resources can influence method performance, and that further validation across different settings and lower pathogen concentrations will be important.

Source: Ceres Nanosciences, Inc. news