Helping preserve the great H2O molecule for the blue planet

Being on the losing team turned out to be a blessing in disguise for Professor Joan B. Rose.

- Sheo Chiong Teng

Hers was the team that lost when two groups vied for the Newater project in 1998.

Prof Rose had signed an exclusive contract to join a consulting engineering group bidding on a wastewater reclamation project in Singapore.

Although this team lost the bid, she had made her mark. Her name was put forward to be on the independent advisory panel, overseeing the science, research and engineering of the project.

And so began a 25-year relationship between Prof Rose and Singapore to come up with better ways of developing clean, safe water.

Prof Rose, 70, an American, holds the Homer Nowlin chair in water research at Michigan State University, where she has worked for the last 22 years. She is the director of the university's Water Alliance, leading interdisciplinary efforts to solve the significant water problems.

An international expert in water microbiology, she is a member of the US National Academy of Engineering, the Royal Institution of Singapore and the EU Academy of Sciences, as well as a corresponding member of the Royal Academy of Sciences and Arts of Barcelona, Spain.

She was awarded the 2016 Stockholm Water Prize Laureate for her tireless contributions to global public health, assessing risks to human health in water, and creating guidelines for communities to improve global health.

Currently, she is a water quality adviser to PUB, the national water agency.