地下水的粪便污染是通过检测总大肠菌群、粪便大肠菌群和肠球菌等细菌指标来确定的。有人担心，在没有指示细菌的情况下，地下水中可能存在致病性人类肠道病毒（HEV），因为它们比细菌体积小，感染时间长。寻找合适的HEV指示剂主要集中在大肠杆菌噬菌体的检测上。虽然大肠杆菌噬菌体的大小与HEV相似，并且具有与HEV相似的环境存活特征，但它们作为可靠指标的使用存在一些潜在的局限性。本研究分析了总大肠菌群、粪便大肠菌群、大肠杆菌和肠球菌，以及大肠杆菌噬菌体、产气荚膜梭菌和甾醇化合物，作为粪便污染和/或地下水直接影响地表水的潜在指标。 包括25个参考文献和表格。

Fecal contamination of groundwater is determined by the detectionof bacterial indicators such as total coliforms, fecal coliforms, and enterococci. There is some concern that pathogenic human enteric viruses (HEV) may be present in groundwater in the absence of indicator bacteria because they are smaller and remain infectious longer than the bacteria. The search for a suitable indicator of HEV has focusedfor the most part on the detection of coliphage. While coliphageare similar in size to HEV and have environmental survival characteristics similar to HEV, there are a number of potential limitations to their use as reliable indicators. This study analyzed total coliform bacteria, fecal coliform bacteria, E. coli, and enterococci as well as coliphage, Clostridium perfringens, and sterol compounds as potential indicators of fecal contamination and/or directsurface water influence of groundwater. Includes 25 references, tables.