
It’s in the wastewater: How Arizona universities are testing for COVID-19
Arizona government leaders have allotted funds to the three state universities to expand research on ways to help communities slow the spread of COVID-19. Some of that support is going to work led by Fulton Schools Professor Rolf Halden and his team at ASU’s Biodesign Center for Environmental Health Engineering. The center’s researchers have been developing a wastewater testing technique that can effectively track the spread of the coronavirus that causes the disease. That effort — along with similar research endeavors at other Arizona universities and others around the country — has evolved into a budding field called wastewater-based epidemiology that is being used across the United States, Europe, Australia and several other countries.