Mariel Perez Zabaleta

Do you have Covid-19? We can know it without testing you!

✓ På plats

✓ Åk 7-9

✓ Gymnasiet

✓ Engelska

✓ Wastewater-based epidemiology

I am Mariel, a researcher from KTH that loves her work. When I was 10 years old I wanted to be a genetic scientist after learning about the cloning of ”Dolly sheep”. After a couple of years (to not say many), I became a biotechnologist and now, I don’t clone animals but work with DNA, RNA and molecular biology.

The main instrument of my research is the water that you discard, YES, wastewater! A small portion of wastewater (40 ml) can give a lot of information about, for example, how many people in a region are sick with Covid-19, influenza or hepatitis.

My research topic is called wastewater-based epidemiology and in this subject, we can detect and monitor different pathogens, microbes resistant to antibiotics, pharmaceuticals, illegal drugs, etc. We can use this tool to answer questions like How many people are sick, or the number of people using illegal drugs in a region.