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Plasma Device Kills Bacteria On Skin In Seconds

Posted by kdawson on from the it's-a-dry-cold dept.

Ponca City, We love you writes "In medicine, plasma, the fourth state of matter, is already used for sterilizing surgical instruments; plasma works at the atomic level and is able to reach all surfaces, even the interior of hollow needle ends. Now the BBC reports that researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics have demonstrated a plasma device that can rid hands, feet, or even underarms of bacteria, including the hospital superbug MRSA, by creating cold atmospheric plasma that produces a cocktail of chemicals that kills bacteria but is harmless to skin. 'The plasma produces a series of over 200 chemical reactions that involve the oxygen and nitrogen in air plus water vapor — there is a whole concoction of chemical species that can be lethal to bacteria,' says Gregor Morfill. 'It's actually similar to what our own immune system does.' The team says that an exposure to the plasma of only about 12 seconds reduces the incidence of bacteria, viruses, and fungi on hands by a factor of a million — a number that stands in sharp contrast to the several minutes hospital staff can take to wash using traditional soap and water. Morfill says that the approach can be used to kill the bacteria that lead to everything from gum disease to body odor and that the prototype is scalable to any size and can be produced in any shape."

37 of 237 comments (clear)

  1. Excessive cleanliness by the_one(2) · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Do you remember the article on /. about how excessive cleanliness isn't all that good for you? Yeah...

    1. Re:Excessive cleanliness by spidercoz · · Score: 4, Funny

      would that be next to excessive godliness? that doesn't sound too good either. I dated a girl in high school that had excessive godliness

      --
      "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - Evelyn Beatrice Hall, re Voltaire
    2. Re:Excessive cleanliness by Chyeld · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Don't know about you kid, but a doc sticking his hand into my insides is one of those situations where I'm willing to forego the 'benefit' of having my immune system stimulated by germs being introduced in the process and ask him to wash up.

    3. Re:Excessive cleanliness by Sycraft-fu · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Do you remember that not everything applies to every situation? Because it doesn't.

      The article about excessive cleanliness was relating to raising children. Basically, our immune systems are like most things in us in that they need to be used to develop. As such children need to get sick to have a well functioning immune system as adults. You don't want to keep them in a sterile environment or they'll never develop defenses.

      However this is for hospitals. There you do want things as clean as possible. You have people who are in weakened states, their ability to fight off disease is less than normal. Also, you are bypassing a lot of their defenses in many cases. Your body is much more difficult to infect via the nose and mouth than directly via an open incision in your chest. As such, maximal clean is desirable.

      This is not an all or nothing thing. Being super clean is not always good or always bad, it depends on the situation. You wouldn't want to buy this for home and turn your house in to a sterile cleanroom from which you never let your kid out. They'd have no immune system and be very vulnerable in the world. However you do want this for hospitals to ensure that wounded and sick people aren't made further sick by an infection that they can't fight in a weakened state.

    4. Re:Excessive cleanliness by Nathrael · · Score: 5, Funny

      I dated a girl in high school that had excessive godliness

      Considering you are posting on Slashdot...was her surname .png?

      --
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    5. Re:Excessive cleanliness by sjames · · Score: 2, Informative

      These are not being suggested for in-home or preschool whole body sanitizing. They're suggested for doctors or nurses working on people with infectious diseases and potentially compromised immune systems. The problem of excessive clenliness isn't caused by washing up, it's caused by obsessively slathering your child in sanitizing gel whenever he might have (god forbid) touched something.

  2. Resistance? by Dwedit · · Score: 2, Insightful

    So how long until we see bacteria resistant to this device?

    1. Re:Resistance? by geekoid · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Never. There is a difference between removing the easy bugs, and complete annihilation of all bacteria it come into contact with. Its like saying the if we had enough super novas humans would become resistant to them.

      --
      The Kruger Dunning explains most post on /. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect
    2. Re:Resistance? by Chyeld · · Score: 5, Informative

      In order to grow resistance, you have to leave a few alive and they have to have been left alive due in some part to something in their makeup causing them to be less vulnerable to the 'weapon'.

      In other words, something that lived only because it was never touched isn't going to evolve into the superbug.

      This eradicates the germs, they aren't being poisoned or having their chemical processes blocked (which is what most antibiotics do), it's ripping the germs apart at the atomic level. You don't develop a resistance to that.

    3. Re:Resistance? by A+beautiful+mind · · Score: 3, Informative

      In order to grow resistance, you have to leave a few alive and they have to have been left alive due in some part to something in their makeup causing them to be less vulnerable to the 'weapon'.

      In other words, something that lived only because it was never touched isn't going to evolve into the superbug.

      Your first sentence is true, the second is false. Position _can_ be a genetic advantage. "Something that lived only because it was never touched" happens all the time in biology, where the positional behaviour can be driven by genetics.

      Birds avoid high altitude, herds don't generally jump off cliffs, etc. The same happens on a more primitive level, too. People think about genetics and think it's like a human arms race or something, but all natural selection needs is surviving members of a species and it will encode _whatever_ information made them survive. Please remember, we're not talking about single instances of plasma sterilization processes, but basically waiting for a mutation to come along that happens to encode the information which in turn makes a significant contribution to the survival of the bacteria. It might not happen often, but if it happens a few times, then that strain will spread.

      --
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    4. Re:Resistance? by Dunbal · · Score: 2, Informative

      So how long until we see bacteria resistant to this device?

            About 20 years after we see bacteria resistant to current gamma ray and UV sterilization techniques. Don't hold your breath. Sterilize means no bacteria or spores survive. Do you think they chose 12 seconds "at random" or because "it sounds cool"? No, 12 seconds is the time (with a probably safety margin built in) at which cultures have shown repeatedly that all bacteria are dead.

      --
      Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
    5. Re:Resistance? by sjames · · Score: 2, Interesting

      It will denature any protein at all. It doesn't harm the surface of your skin only because that is already composed of dead cells. Bacteria are about as likely to evolve resistance to fire or concentrated nitric acid.

  3. sweet by spidercoz · · Score: 2, Funny

    I want a plasma bathtub

    --
    "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - Evelyn Beatrice Hall, re Voltaire
    1. Re:sweet by weav · · Score: 3, Insightful

      A plasma bathtub would be good but what *I* really want is a plasma TOOTHBRUSH...

    2. Re:sweet by AmberBlackCat · · Score: 3, Funny

      They'll never catch on because the LCD's are brighter.

  4. Kick-ass for hospitals by Aggrajag · · Score: 2, Interesting

    As a nurse I would welcome this as I have to wash and disinfect my hands several times a day.

    1. Re:Kick-ass for hospitals by geekoid · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Wouldn't you still need to wash hands to remove the larger bit of stuff stuck to your hands? Bacteria is the primary reason why you need to wash your hands all the time, but not the only one.

      --
      The Kruger Dunning explains most post on /. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect
    2. Re:Kick-ass for hospitals by jpmorgan · · Score: 2, Informative

      Removing bulk material is comparatively easy, when needed. Washing to decontaminate, as is required frequently in hospitals, is a much more arduous task.

    3. Re:Kick-ass for hospitals by Aggrajag · · Score: 2, Informative

      Sorry, a non-english speaker here- On a normal day I wash and disinfect my hands about sixty times.

  5. Good bacteria? by Lord+Lode · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I thought a lot of the bacteria in and on humans were good ones, which are required to be fit and healthy and function properly. What happens to those?

    1. Re:Good bacteria? by Cedric+Tsui · · Score: 5, Funny

      The same thing that happens to them when you wash with antibacterial soap.

    2. Re:Good bacteria? by Dunbal · · Score: 3, Informative

      The same thing that happens to them when you wash with antibacterial soap.

            One of the most overrated products in the world. Everyone thinks they're getting "anti-bacterial" protection.

            If you want "clean hands" while washing with antibacterial soap, make sure you do like we surgeons and wash each hand for 15 minutes. Even then you'll have critters living in your sweat glands... but your bacterial count will be very very low. For the regular "less time than it takes to sing the the birthday song" hand washing, anti-bacterial soap offers virtually no advantage over regular soap.

            Now hands up who spends 30 mins washing their hands every time they touch something.

      --
      Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
    3. Re:Good bacteria? by Dunbal · · Score: 2

      being able to fairly safely eat a sandwich with your hands?

            You have your own blend of bacteria, and shouldn't have trouble with a sandwich even if you haven't washed your hands. After all, those Peyer's patches should count for something in identifying and producing antibodies for your home blend of bacteria.

            The trouble is when a) someone prepares your sandwich without washing their hands, thus inoculating you with strange bacteria and b) when you touch other people, things other people have touched, or bodily fluids from other people. I say people but some rare (nowadays) diseases can be acquired from animals. Of course you can get sick by eating food that hasn't been prepared properly and has acquired pathogens from the environment, too - then no amount of hand washing on your or the cook's part will help you with say the Potato-Mayonnaise-S. aureus salad, good old undercooked-eggs-and Salmonella typhi salad, or the famous Not-Quite-Canned-Preserves-with-Botulinum toxin...

            Most courses that teach hygiene, in and outside of medical school, recommend washing your hands approximately the duration of the "Happy Birthday" (c) song - about 30 seconds with regular soap for "everyday hand washing". For minor surgery, about 3 minutes per hand including the wrists, scrubbing the hands and under the nails, and for major surgery 15 minutes per hand and forearm up to the elbow, with a scrubbing brush. Do remember to wash between your fingers. But remember, you will rarely make yourself sick (unless you have some auto-immune problem). It's other people/things that make you sick.

      --
      Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
    4. Re:Good bacteria? by Dunbal · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Its about time we have a decent solution instead of 15 mins of washing, where are the scientists on this one, 15 mins * few times a day * 1000000 surgens at their salary levels = billions of dollars wasted time.

            There's a problem with your accounting: you're forgetting to offset this by the cost of millions of infected patients staying longer at the hospital, the antibiotics used, and the inevitable fatalities.

            The standard infection rate for most wounds is around 10% in nature. Aseptic procedure (hand washing, sterile equipment, etc) has brought this down to under 1%. So tack on a week or so in the hospital (plus the fatalities) for 9% of all surgeries performed in the world, then compare it to hand washing.

            Not to mention the ethical side. We wash our hands because it's part of our "do no harm" credo.

      --
      Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
    5. Re:Good bacteria? by PitaBred · · Score: 2, Funny

      Thanks. Now I have to go wash my hands after typing this. Another half-hour before I can get to bed.

      --
      My blog. Good stuff (when I remember to update it). Read it.
  6. Babylon 5 showed something like ths by Painted · · Score: 3, Interesting

    There was a scene on Babylon 5 where Sheridan and Garibaldi are killing time in a public restroom waiting for someone to leave (yeah, a Sci-Fi show that admits people go to the bathroom!), and Sheridan is shown "washing" his hands under what appears to be a disinfecting device...

    Funny how you can often find references in fiction to things that later become reality...

    --
    http://marsandmore.com - Posters of space, spacecraft, and astronomy.
  7. Re:Okay, I know this is off-topic... by sakdoctor · · Score: 5, Funny

    That's just coincidental. Besides there were FIVE elements; Fire, water, earth, air and orange haired Ukrainian chick.

  8. Re:Of course... by marcosdumay · · Score: 2, Insightful

    It wont. There are way more effective ways if using the same amount of energy on a weapon.

    --
    Rethinking email
  9. Re:Surface only, though? by Dunbal · · Score: 4, Interesting

    If it's germ free and not large enough to be visible, does it matter?

          It does if you're a surgeon. There's something called the foreign body response, and we've seen it happen even with particles of the STERILE talc they line some surgical gloves with to make them easier to put on. Problems aren't only caused by bacteria. Depending on the person's immune response, virtually anything can cause a life-threatening reaction to normally "inert" things like nylon suture or titanium rods/sutures. Things like dirt and human hair are more likely to provoke a reaction.

    --
    Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
  10. Re:Okay, I know this is off-topic... by BarryJacobsen · · Score: 4, Informative

    That's just coincidental. Besides there were FIVE elements; Fire, water, earth, air and orange haired Ukrainian chick.

    Everyone knows that the fifth element is Heart and is represented by a South American with a monkey. Source

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  11. I'll bite by xigxag · · Score: 3, Funny

    Rachael Ray?

    --
    There are two kinds of people: 1) those who start arrays with one and 1) those who start them with zero.
  12. Re:Okay, I know this is off-topic... by JoshuaZ · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Actually, there were 5 elements according to Aristole: Earth, Air, Fire, Water and Aether. The fifth element only appears in the spheres beyond Earth. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aristotle#The_five_elements. Post Copernicus, Kepler and Galileo, when it became apparent that objects in space were likely made of the same substances as other elements Aether was dropped. This didn't last long, since the classical elemental theory was already in decline. Robert Boyle's work in The Sceptical Chymist published in 1661 effectively ended the idea of the then four element theory. So four elements was really only an idea with widespread appeal to scientists and thinkers for about 50 years.

  13. Re:Okay, I know this is off-topic... by MadUndergrad · · Score: 4, Funny

    Ninety seconds? Look at who thinks he's a bigshot, Mr. "I'm not a minute-man anymore". Now to click "post anonymously" to protect myself from embarrassment.

  14. Re:as a nurse, you should know better by RemyBR · · Score: 2

    If it can clean the hollow tip of a needle, I'd think that dirt under your nails wouldn't be a problem. One of the posters above is right though, this is not going to eliminate the need to wash your hands to remove the "bulk" dirt.

    --
    Cosplayers.net - The Cosplayers Network
  15. Re:as a nurse, you should know better by Aggrajag · · Score: 2

    This would mean using less disinfectant, the alcohol dries my hands.

  16. Re:Okay, I know this is off-topic... by SteveFoerster · · Score: 2, Funny

    Um, guys? The Fifth Element was LOVE? HELLOOOOOO?

    What, and you don't consider "Milla Jovovich" and "love" to be interchangeable?

    --
    Space game using normal deck of cards: http://BattleCards.org
  17. Re:Okay, I know this is off-topic... by nacturation · · Score: 3, Interesting

    And four compass directions: North, South, East, and West. The bible mentions the four corners of the (flat, square) Earth too. All these references to four! Before you know it, your post will get modded to Score: 4, Interesting.

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