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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.
"advertise antibacterial tie line"
How 19th century.
Nowadays, you contribute $50000 to your representative's campaign fund, and he or she conjures up a law REQUIRING individuals in medical facilities to wear antibacterial ties.
You can't see ANYTHING from a car, You've got to get out of the goddamned contraption and walk...Edward Abbey
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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