University of Illinois Chicago associate professor Rachel Poretsky is doing sewage surveillance through the University of Illinois’ Discovery Partners Institute. Poretsky is co-leading a team with computer scientist Charlie Catlett that’s using Chicago wastewater to identify viral hot spots. “When there’s incomplete data, or holes in the data, that’s when wastewater data is really useful,” said Poretsky. “At each stage of the pandemic there were citywide and nationwide testing challenges. There were often months without tests, or the wrong tests or extremely long waits to get appointments.”