Marcos Fioravanti and Chris Canaday of Fundación In Terris in Ecuador will develop an easy-to-use urine-diverting dry toilet that uses a pedal to "flush" feces into a pipe and mix the waste with dry material for faster composting. Following toilet use, pushing the pedal turns an auger in the pipe, withdrawing the waste to eliminate odors and to enable safe sanitation, after which it can be used as fertilizer. In Phase I, they designed, built and laboratory-tested three prototypes with varying designs. The two best designs, one for home use and one for public use, were field tested in Ecuador to evaluate performance and usability. In Phase II, Fioravanti, now working with co-investigator Chuck Henry, will further refine the design through feedback from the field, and test modified prototypes with a view to conduct large-scale local demonstrations across different continents to promote user acceptance. They will also look to scale-up manufacturing to low-cost mass production.

Virginia Gardiner of Loowatt Ltd. in the United Kingdom will develop a waterless toilet that uses biodegradable film to safely separate and seal waste into a portable cartridge for local anaerobic digestion. The digester will produce fuel (biogas) and fertilizer, creating local waste treatment economies. In Phase I Gardiner performed market research in Madagascar to adapt the basic toilet system to local contexts and to develop a business model. She further developed the toilet, digester, and post-treatment system, and built a pilot system that was tested using human waste in the laboratory. In Phase II, Loowatt looks to scale-up their technology and tools for the global market by further developing the anaerobic digester, readying toilet components for mass production and local manufacture and supply, and exploring local manufacturing possibilities for the biodegradable film.

Peter Dreher of Livvon LLC in the U.S. is developing a simple, low-cost toilet for resource-poor settings that uses a hand crank to remove the water from infected feces and urine, and converts the feces into dry, harmless, odorless pellets in a sealed bag that can be used for fertilizer or fuel. The air-tight system will also control odor and keep out flies and vermin, and requires no water, chemicals, or electricity. The system will help to contain human pathogens such as strains of Escherichia coli that cause many diseases and are particularly deadly to small children. In Phase I, they built the toilet and tested it on cow feces, which has similar water and bacteria content to humans. They found that it killed all the pathogens, sealed in odor, and the urine collector made nitrogen fertilizer. In Phase II, they will adapt the design for mass production, and develop a sustainable business model that generates revenue from the fertilizer and from electricity, which will be produced by a feces-fueled generator, to cover the cost of the toilet and collection service. They will also develop a reward system for using the toilets. They will produce several thousand toilets to test their business model in Africa or Haiti, and evaluate the profit or loss.

Joao Goncalves of ADEIM - Faculdade de Farmacia Lisboa in Portugal proposes to develop molecular sensor strategies using nanoparticles to target memory T cells to deliver a toxin that will be expressed when zinc-finger proteins detect HIV-1 sequences.