1. Effects of chemically-reductive trace gas contaminants on non-thermal plasma inactivation of an airborne virus.
- Author
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Ma Z, Dwivedi AK, and Clack HL
- Subjects
- Aerosols, Levivirus drug effects, Air Pollutants, Plasma Gases, Virus Inactivation drug effects, Air Microbiology
- Abstract
Transmission of airborne infectious diseases poses great risk for public health and socio-economic stability, thus, there is a need for an effective control method targeting the spread and transmission of pathogenic aerosols. The existence of chemically-reductive trace air contaminants in animal agriculture may affect the oxidation inactivation process of pathogens. In this study, we report how the presence of such gasses impacts the effectiveness of using non-thermal plasma (NTP) within a packed-bed dielectric barrier discharge reactor to inactivate MS2 bacteriophage. Inactivation of the aerosolized bacteriophage is determined by the combination of viability and polymerase chain reaction assays. Using a plasma power source with a voltage of 20 kV and frequency of 350 Hz, after differentiating and excluding the physical removal effects of viral aerosols potentially caused by plasma, the baseline inactivation of MS2 aerosol in air has been determined based on an overall air flow rate of 200 Liters per minute and plasma discharge power of 1.8 W. When either ammonia or hydrogen sulfide gas is introduced into the airstream at a concentration of 1 part per million, the NTP virus inactivation efficiency is reduced to around 0.5-log from the 1-log baseline inactivation in air alone. Higher concentrations of those gasses will not further inhibit the effectiveness of plasma inactivation., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare the following financial interests/personal relationships which may be considered as potential competing interests: Co-author Herek L. Clack is co-founder and chief scientific officer at Taza Aya (www.taza-aya.com) If there are other authors, they declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2024 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)
- Published
- 2024
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