UB
Vircont

Laboratory of Viruses Contaminants of Water and Food

The Laboratory of Viruses Contaminants of Water and Food  belongs to the Department of Genetics, Microbiology and Statistics of the University of Barcelona (UB).

Our research is based on the study of hepatitis A and E (HAV and HEV) viruses, enteroviruses, adenoviruses, noroviruses, polyomaviruses and other emerging human viruses such as SARS-CoV-2 that can be transmitted by water or contaminated foods. We also apply the detection of several indicator viruses for tracing faecal contamination in the environment (Microbial Source Tracking). We work to develop and optimize methods to detect and study the characteristics of all these viruses and we are interested in adapting these techniques to be able to apply them to "in situ" scenarios as could be contexts of humanitarian crises. We are also foused on the study of potential emerging viruses transmitted by water or food using New Generation Sequencing (NGS) tools. We are also members of the Catalan Network for SARS-CoV-2 monitoring in wastewater.

The group is part of:
• The Water Institute of the University of Barcelona (http://www.ub.edu/aigua/ca)
• The Consolidated Research Group of the Generalitat of Catalonia "VIRBAP, Viruses, bacteria and protozoa of interest in water and food"

 

Viruses from large-volume water samples

We have recently published our work on the evaluation of a virus concentration method based on ultrafiltration and wet foam elution for studying viruses from large-volume water samples as a open acces paper:

Webinar: Pandemia de COVID-19, implicaciones...

Organized by CWP. 9 Abril 2020: https://vimeo.com/405842574

Detecció de SARS cov2 en aigua residual

El nostre grup de recerca en col.laboració amb els grups liderats per Lluís Corominas i Carles Borrego de l'ICRA (Institut Català de Recerca de l'Aigua) de Girona duem a terme un estudi sobre la presència de SARSCoV2 en Estacions Depuradores d'Aigua Residual a Catalunya.

Microbiological contamination of conventional...