Reading wastewater DNA to find the pipes about to fail

Buried sewers corrode out of sight — until a leak or a sinkhole announces them. Researchers at Japan's Tohoku University measured DNA from corrosion-linked bacteria in wastewater from 40 manholes, mapped where those bacteria thrive, and fed the maps into a machine-learning model tested against inspections of 3,498 pipe sections. Adding the biological signal sharpened the model's aim at severely corroded pipes. Professor Daisuke Sano's point is practical: cities can inspect first where failure is likeliest, and fix pipes before they break. The work is published in the Journal of Environmental Management.

SDG 11 · Sustainable cities and communities — Mechanism: tech innovation