摘要：Sun, salt, and lime juice may sound like ingredi-ents for a vacation margarita, but recent research suggests they can also be used to help purify drinking water easily and cheaply—the type of solutions needed by millions of people in developing countries. Some 780 million people across the globe are still without reliable access to safe drinking water.1Bringing safe water to these people will depend on making affordable, technically feasible solutions available.The solar disinfection of drinking water, or SODIS, method is one such solution now being used by more than 5 million people in 24 African, Asian, and Latin American countr ies.2Water poured into clear or blue polyethylene terephthalate water bottles (glass bot tle s a lso can be used) i s expo sed to sunlight for at least 6 hours, or up to 48 hours in cloudy we ather. The heat and ultraviolet r adi ation of the sunlight kill bacteria and protozoan parasites and inactivate assorted viruses. This method is reported to signif icantly reduce the number of c hildren falling il l to diarrheal diseases (some studies suggesting by up to 70%) and c holera (by approximately 86%).3A lthough que stions have been raised about the lea chi ng of plastici zer s and other hor-monally active chemicals from heated plastic bot tle s, studie s to date indicate the SODIS method doe s not impar t an unusua l burden of endocrine disruptors to drinking water
