Silver Nanowire-Modified Filter with Controllable Silver Ion Release for Point-of-Use Disinfection.

Waterborne diseases related to unsafe water are still major threats to public health in some developing countries and rural areas. Providing affordable and safe drinking water globally remains a great challenge in the coming decades. In this study, we develop a high-throughput and conductive silver nanowire (AgNW)-modified composite filter via depositing thin and ultralong AgNWs on a macroporous substrate. An electrochemical filtration cell (EFC) equipped with the composite filter achieves controllable Ag+ release at a μg L-1 level and superior bacterial inactivation performance (>6-log inactivation efficiency) with an operation voltage of only 1 V at a high flux of 100 m3 h-1 m-2. Under such operation conditions, each composite filter (effective area: 0.79 cm2) can treat at least 750 mL of the bacterial suspension (∼107 CFU mL-1 of Escherichia coli) with a low effluent Ag+ concentration below 50 μg L-1 and almost negligible energy consumption of only ∼70 J m-3.