Meet the Lume

Name: Virridy Lume
Brand: Virridy
Price: 200 USD
Availability: InStock

Got Poop? Find out if you're drinking or swimming in contaminated water.

The Lume is the first single-unit fluorimetric sensor for continuous microbial contamination monitoring. Its integrated power and data transmission reduce deployment and maintenance costs while delivering higher sensitivity and accuracy than other sensors or traditional sampling methods.

Continuous water quality monitoring — for the cost of a single grab sample.

TLF for microbial contamination • Chlorophyll-a for algae • FDOM for dissolved organics & nutrients

The Virridy Lume: a sensitive, continuous, in-situ, remotely reporting tryptophan-like fluorescence sensor for semi-quantification of fecal contamination as E. coli.

Continuous Water Quality Monitoring

Public health and pollution-response decisions depend on timely, spatially resolved information. Traditional culture-based sampling typically delivers results 24–48 hours after collection and is often too sparse to capture short-lived or localized contamination events. As a result, many contamination pulses remain undetected.

The Lume's primary configuration measures tryptophan-like fluorescence (TLF) to estimate microbial contamination risk in near real time. The same platform also supports chlorophyll-a (Cl-A) for algae monitoring and fluorescent dissolved organic matter (FDOM) for tracking dissolved organics and nutrient loading. Each sensor operates autonomously and transmits data via cellular or satellite networks to a secure cloud platform.

One platform, three measurement modes — thousands of in-situ estimates for the cost of a single grab sample.

Proven Performance for Microbial Risk Assessment

Field and laboratory evaluations demonstrate that Lume provides reliable quantitative and categorical estimates of microbial contamination across environmentally relevant concentration ranges. Model-estimated E. coli concentrations closely align with laboratory reference methods over approximately three orders of magnitude.

75%+

Accuracy across 0–1,000 CFU/100 mL

>94%

Categorical accuracy with site-specific calibration

Mean absolute percentage error (log-transformed)

1 year

Battery life on hourly sampling

What Lume Enables

Continuous microbial data allow organizations to move from reactive to proactive water quality management. By capturing rapid changes that occur between laboratory samples, Lume supports earlier detection of contamination events and more confident decision-making.

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Detect contamination as it occurs

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Support same-day recreational water advisories

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Continuously screen source and receiving waters between lab analyses

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Prioritize confirmatory sampling

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Improve situational awareness during storms and infrastructure failures

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Reduce uncertainty between sampling campaigns

Sensors over Samples

An array provides the temporal and spatial coverage that single grab samples cannot. By measuring every few minutes, arrays capture short-duration events that a weekly schedule typically misses. Placing sensors to bracket reaches, confluences, and outfalls adds spatial resolution.

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Bracket reaches, confluences, and outfalls

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Localize hotspots and rank likely sources

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Higher decision accuracy for advisories and source ID

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Reduce routine logistics and lab spend

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Rapid outcome verification of BMPs and repairs

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Monitor chlorinated piped water and distributed systems

Real-World Applications

Lume is deployed across a range of monitoring contexts, including drinking water source protection, wastewater discharge monitoring, and recreational water management.

Piped systems & community wells

Filtration & disinfection processes

Drinking water source protection

Treated effluent & receiving waters

Urban stormwater & CSO systems

Agricultural return flows

Rivers, beaches, parks & marinas

Algal bloom early warning (Cl-A)

Nutrient & organic carbon tracking (FDOM)

Public-facing dashboards & alerts

Recreational water & beach advisories

Reservoir & intake monitoring

Three Measurement Modes, One Platform

The Lume platform uses interchangeable optical configurations to address different water quality challenges — all sharing the same hardware, connectivity, and cloud analytics.

Lume TLF — Microbial Contamination

Measures tryptophan-like fluorescence (Ex 280 nm / Em 350 nm) as a real-time proxy for fecal contamination and E. coli. The primary Lume configuration, validated across drinking water, natural waters, and wastewater applications worldwide.

Drinking water • Recreational water • Source tracking • CSOs

Lume Cl-A — Algae

Measures chlorophyll-a fluorescence (Ex 470 nm / Em 680 nm) for continuous monitoring of algal biomass and bloom detection. Enables early warning of harmful algal blooms (HABs) in reservoirs, lakes, and intake waters.

Reservoirs • Lakes • Intakes • HAB early warning

Lume FDOM — Dissolved Organics & Nutrients

Measures fluorescent dissolved organic matter (Ex 365 nm / Em 480 nm) as an indicator of dissolved organic carbon, humic substances, and nutrient loading. Supports watershed characterization and treatment process monitoring.

Nutrient loading • DOC tracking • Treatment optimization

Built on Science. Ready for Scale.

Lume builds on peer-reviewed research and multi-site field validation to address the limitations of traditional microbial monitoring approaches. By combining optical sensing with adaptive data modeling, Lume maintains performance under changing environmental conditions where static thresholds and infrequent sampling fall short.

Every Lume deployment generates a continuous, high-resolution record of microbial risk—enabling utilities, regulators, and watershed managers to identify contamination sources, verify the effectiveness of interventions, and build defensible compliance records without the cost and delay of repeated laboratory analysis.

Start an Array Today

$200 /month per site

10+ unit standard deployment · 12-month minimum

Device lease included
Cellular/satellite connectivity
Secure cloud hosting & data dashboard
API access
Fleet health monitoring
Remote updates
Onboarding & siting support

Alex Johnson

Chief Strategy Officer

[email protected]
+1-503-504-9668

Hardware and Analytics

Sensor Capabilities

TLF mode: E. coli and microbial contamination (280/350 nm)
Cl-A mode: algal biomass and bloom detection (470/680 nm)
FDOM mode: dissolved organics and nutrient loading (365/480 nm)
Turbidity sensor for NTU quantification
Temperature sensor for data and correction
GPS coordinates
No regular calibration or cleaning required
Lower retail cost than competitors

Operations

Sampling: 30 sec to 24 hours (remote config)
Reporting: 5 min to several days
Battery: up to 1 year (hourly sampling, 24h reporting)
Power: solar or wall charging
Cellular & satellite connectivity
Single integrated unit — no external power/telemetry
Machine learning microbial quantification
Protected online dashboard and API

Implementation Design

Array design: joint siting plan to bracket sources
Deployment: mount, power, connect — data in minutes
Operations: alerts for exceedances/events
Periodic siting optimization as patterns emerge
Verification via continuous data streams

Data Governance & Integration

Role-based dashboard access
Export to existing platforms via API
Audit trail: device health, uptime, data quality
Documentation: SOPs, siting rationales, QA/QC

Lume Design

The Lume is a fully integrated, internet-connected (cellular and satellite) sensor solution. The sensor head can be configured for TLF (microbial contamination), Cl-A (algae), or FDOM (dissolved organics), alongside integrated turbidity and temperature measurements. Sampling can be remotely programmed for between 30 seconds and 24 hours, and reporting between 5 minutes and several days. With 24-hour reporting, the battery will last up to a year on a single charge. The sensor head can be cleaned with a hand-twist removal of the cover. The battery can be charged with solar or wall power. The antenna can be internal to the Lume, an external whip, or on a wire.