Method and a system for determination of particles in a liquid sample

A method for the assessment of at least one quantity parameter and/or at least one quality parameter of bacteria in a liquid analyte material, comprising

• applying a volume of a liquid sample representing the analyte material, or bacteria isolated from a volume of liquid sample representing the analyte material, to an exposing domain from which exposing domain electromagnetic signals from the sample in the domain can pass to the exterior,
• exposing, onto an array of active detection elements, an at least one-dimensional spatial representation of electromagnetic signals having passed from the domain, the representation being one which is detectable as a intensity by individual active detection elements, under conditions which will permit processing of the intensities detected by the array of detection elements during the exposure in such a manner that representations of electromagnetic signals from the bacteria are identified as distinct from representations of electromagnetic signals from background signals, and wherein the spatial representation exposed onto the array of detection elements is subject to such a linear enlargement that the ratio of the image of a linear dimension on the array of detection elements to the original linear dimension in the exposing domain is smaller than 10:1,
• processing the intensities detected by the detection elements in such a manner that signals from the bacteria are identified as distinct from background signals,
• and correlating the results of the processing to the at least one quantity parameter and/or the at least one quality parameter of the liquid analyte material.