See more objects with the tag water, health, access.

Object Timeline

  • We acquired this object.

1993

  • Work on this object began.

2013

  • Work on this object ended.

2016

2025

  • You found it!

SONO Water Filter

This is a Project. It was designed by Abul Hussam and Abul K. M. Munir. It is dated 1993–2013. Its medium is sand, composite iron matrix, wood charcoal, brick chips, plastic buckets, tubing, metal.

Arsenic, a deadly poison abundant in Bangladesh’s soil and rock, has leached up through the water table into wells across the country, exposing millions of people. Abul Hussam, a chemistry professor from George Mason University, designed SONO water filter, an inexpensive method to filter drinking water using a composite iron matrix (CIM) absorbant. The two-bucket system strains contaminated groundwater through sand, the CIM, charcoal, and brick chips to remove toxins, producing potable water. Test results indicate SONO can remove arsenic, manganese (a neurotoxin), iron, and all transition metal ions. Filters can last at least fourteen years at the present usage rate of one hundred liters per day, sufficient for a family of five.

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<ref name=CH>{{cite web |url=https://www-4.collection.cooperhewitt.org/objects/420778997/ |title=SONO Water Filter |author=Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum |accessdate=6 February 2025 |publisher=Smithsonian Institution}}</ref>