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Making Medical Clothing That Kills Bugs (economist.com)
Many doctors now are likely to wear everyday clothes, or blue or green "scrubs", which are said to reduce eye strain in brightly-lit operating theatres. White coats are reckoned to be capable of spreading diseases as easily as clothing of any other colour, especially when long sleeves brush against multiple surfaces. Many clinics and hospitals now have a "bare below the elbows" policy for staff, whether in uniform or their own clothes. This is also supposed to encourage more thorough handwashing. What, though, if the clothes worn by medical staff could actively help prevent bugs being passed around? From a report: Some metals, such as gold and silver, have natural antibacterial properties and are used to coat certain solid items, such as medical implants. But putting metallic coatings onto stretchy and foldable fabrics is tricky, and those coatings can quickly be swept away in a washing machine. What is needed, reckons Liu Xuqing of the University of Manchester, in England, is a way to make antibacterial coatings for fabrics that, quite literally, hold tight.
Instead of gold or silver, Dr Liu's metal of choice is copper. This exhibits the same bug-killing properties but has the benefit of being an awful lot cheaper than those two precious metals, making a commercial coating process easier to devise. Working with colleagues from two Chinese institutions, Northwest Minzu University in Lanzhou and Southwest University in Chongqing, Dr Liu has been treating samples of fabric with a chemical process that grafts what is called a "polymer brush" onto their surfaces. As the name suggests, when viewed at a resolution of a few nanometres (billionths of a metre) through an electron microscope, the polymer strands look like tiny protruding bristles. That done they use a second chemical procedure to coat the bristles with a catalyst.
After this, they immerse the fabric in a copper-containing solution from which the catalyst causes the metal to precipitate and form tiny particles that anchor themselves to the polymer brush. Indeed, they bond so tightly that Dr Liu compares the resulting coating to reinforced concrete. Yet the process takes place at such a minute scale on the surface of the fabric that it should not affect the feel or quality of the finished material.
Instead of gold or silver, Dr Liu's metal of choice is copper. This exhibits the same bug-killing properties but has the benefit of being an awful lot cheaper than those two precious metals, making a commercial coating process easier to devise. Working with colleagues from two Chinese institutions, Northwest Minzu University in Lanzhou and Southwest University in Chongqing, Dr Liu has been treating samples of fabric with a chemical process that grafts what is called a "polymer brush" onto their surfaces. As the name suggests, when viewed at a resolution of a few nanometres (billionths of a metre) through an electron microscope, the polymer strands look like tiny protruding bristles. That done they use a second chemical procedure to coat the bristles with a catalyst.
After this, they immerse the fabric in a copper-containing solution from which the catalyst causes the metal to precipitate and form tiny particles that anchor themselves to the polymer brush. Indeed, they bond so tightly that Dr Liu compares the resulting coating to reinforced concrete. Yet the process takes place at such a minute scale on the surface of the fabric that it should not affect the feel or quality of the finished material.
but you won't know for years or decades. Let's call you control group A.
Anyone remember asbestos, now we have nano particles that embed them selves into our lungs and cause damage, I'm guessing this would have similar effect over a long period of time for the users of such clothes.
Another source of heavy metals in our environment.
Green surgical scrubs are for more than just reducing eye strain. Green is the opposite of red in the opponent process of how the human visual system works. Our blood is red, due to the iron content, so green scrubs provide the best contrast and thus ensure blood is most visible.
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
In heavy bleach. I'm all for this type of improvements to hospital clothing, but I wonder how long those additions survive and this seems a little optimistic.
This is gonna look great with my tinfoil hat!
>> What, though, if the clothes worn by medical staff could actively help prevent bugs being passed around
First, please stop talking to us like we are stoned high schoolers. "Bugs" -> bacteria/viruses? "What, though, if" -> "Imagine if"
Second, no, having antibacterial threads would make almost no difference in the average medical facility. Just think of what gets tracked in on visitor shoes, lands on medical personnel's socks or skin after trips to the bathroom, trips between sick patients and between hand washings, and is festering in seldom-cleaned corners/ducts/etc.
No wonder my coworkers looked at me funny when I wear my long-sleeve sweater in the weapons bio lab.
Goodbye, Slashdot!
Normally hospitals will follow best practices to reduce infections. When they pay attention to them and enforce these rules hard, infection rate on patients go way down. The biggest concern with this technology is the fact it is a lot of money for a marginal benefit, and could give organizations a false sense of security and be more lax on their practices.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Not exactly sure why they'd go through some crazy process to put copper in fabric. The Japanese Indigo plant has long exhibited antibacterial properties. Why not just dye scrubs with that?
https://link.springer.com/arti...
Instead of gold or silver, Dr Liu's metal of choice is copper. This exhibits the same bug-killing properties but has the benefit of being an awful lot cheaper than those two precious metals
But doesn't copper tarnish/oxidize more easily? Sure it would work great while it's pure copper. But wash it a few times and I doubt it will do any good.
Sports clothes manufacturers have produced silver based bug killing garments for years, albeit their only interest was to kill the bacteria eating your sweat and creating the ominous BO stink.
What kills me is how often I see medical staff wearing their scrubs out in public. I'm a long ways from a germophobe but a very significant part of their job is working with people with all sorts of infections and diseases, there could be anything on those things. It's great they can just walk out of work without changing but I'd rather not get a staff infection because a nurse brushed up against me while I was waiting in line for a sandwich at lunch time.
A little off topic I know but if scrubs were able to "prevent bugs being passed around" I'd feel a little better standing by these people.
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It's so great the language police is here to protect us. What a horror it is for some one to refer to bacteria as "bugs"!
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There are lots of medical professionals in my area who wear scrubs from home to whatever hospital instead of changing into them at work. They wear them dropping kids off at daycare, getting their car serviced at the local lube shop and even hang around Starbucks in them before participating in everything from blood draws to surgical procedures. Sure, bacteria resistant scrubs might be helpful but not as much as making medical staff change into their scrubs at whatever clinical venue they provide patient services.
I live in NYC
I see medical personnel wear their scrubs to outside venues, including parks. They sit on benches with bird poop and the gowns touch the pavement in the same non-clean environment.
After lunch, they walk back to work and effuse the "sanitary" wardrobe that is now filthier than the plain clothes that they may have donned in the morning.
OK, I'm sure surgeons clean up nice but what about the GP or other specialists that don't have a stringent scrub protocol.
Dr. Liu Xuqing is a Chinese, working for the University of Manchester.
For this research, Dr. Liu partners with two Chinese institutions, Northwest Minzu University in Lanzhou and Southwest University in Chongqing.
More and more research are being done by the Chinese, and one day, they will become our new overlords.
Using Copper can cause increase in copper resistance and co-selwct for resistance towards other antimicrobial agents. Here is the first example Google found for me. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0269749117311624
They should do what I do. I've been wearing the same clothes for the last 20 years. My stink can take out every living thing within 50 yards.
From top hit on google:
"It's called the oligodynamic effect, and it's the result of metal ions in brass and copper having a toxic effect on molds, spores, viruses, and other living cells. Unvarnished brass doorknobs magically disinfect themselves in about eight hours."
I think we've been here before.... https://www.sciencehistory.org...
Brass doesn't tarnish so easily. Copper does.