Inactivation Characteristics of Bacteria in Capacitively Coupled Argon Plasma

Author

Sureshkumar ; Neogi, Sudarsan

Author_Institution

Dept. of Chem. Eng., Indian Inst. of Technol. Kharagpur, Kharagpur, India

Volume

37

Issue

12

fYear

2009

Firstpage

2347

Lastpage

2352

Abstract

Plasma technology is being focused on the medical, food, and pharmaceutical fields for sterilization applications. The sterilizing effect of the 13.56-MHz radio-frequency (RF) plasma generated by using argon gas was studied using Staphylococcus aureus, one of the most common pathogens liable to hospital-acquired infections. The major focus of this paper was to perform a parametric study by varying the external-process parameters such as plasma treatment time, RF power, gas-flow rate, and pressure on the inactivation of S. aureus. The results were supported by optical emission spectroscopy and scanning electron microscopy studies.

Keywords

argon; biomedical engineering; chemical reactors; decontamination; food processing industry; health care; microorganisms; pharmaceutical industry; plasma applications; scanning electron microscopy; surface treatment; Staphylococcus aureus; bacteria inactivation characteristics; capacitively coupled argon plasma; hospital-acquired infections; optical emission spectroscopy; plasma technology; scanning electron microscopy; sterilization application; Argon; Food technology; Microorganisms; Optical microscopy; Parametric study; Pathogens; Pharmaceutical technology; Plasma applications; Plasma properties; Radio frequency; Biomedical engineering; plasma applications; sterilization; surface contamination; surface treatment;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Plasma Science, IEEE Transactions on

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0093-3813

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/TPS.2009.2033112

Filename

5318277