Water chlorination
[1][2][3] In a paper published in 1894, it was formally proposed to add chlorine to water to render it "germ-free".
[8] Chlorination was achieved by controlled additions of dilute solutions of chloride of lime (calcium hypochlorite) at doses of 0.2 to 0.35 ppm.
The treatment process was conceived by John L. Leal, and the chlorination plant was designed by George Warren Fuller.
[9] Over the next few years, chlorine disinfection using chloride of lime (calcium hypochlorite) was rapidly implemented in drinking water systems around the world.
[10] The technique of purification of drinking water by use of compressed liquefied chlorine gas was developed by a British officer in the Indian Medical Service, Vincent B. Nesfield, in 1903.
This might be accomplished in two ways: by liquefying it, and storing it in lead-lined iron vessels, having a jet with a very fine capillary canal, and fitted with a tap or a screw cap.
"[11] Major Carl Rogers Darnall, Professor of Chemistry at the Army Medical School, gave the first practical demonstration of this in 1910.
Shortly after Darnall's demonstration, Major William J. L. Lyster of the Army Medical Department used a solution of calcium hypochlorite in a linen bag to treat water.
[citation needed] Chlorine gas was first used on a continuing basis to disinfect the water supply at the Belmont filter plant, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania by using a machine invented by Charles Frederick Wallace[citation needed] who dubbed it the Chlorinator.
[16] The microscopic agents of many diseases such as cholera, typhoid fever, and dysentery killed countless people annually before disinfection methods were employed routinely.
It is able to disintegrate the lipids that compose the cell wall and react with intracellular enzymes and proteins, making them nonfunctional.
In high doses, bromoform mainly slows down regular brain activity, which is manifested by symptoms such as sleepiness or sedation.
Chronic exposure to both bromoform and dibromochloromethane can cause liver and kidney cancer, as well as heart disease, unconsciousness, or death in high doses.
