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upstart writes in with an IRC submission for carny:

wash-your-damn-hands-and-clothes

Durable, washable textile coating can repel viruses: New research could lead to safely reusable PPE:

Research from the LAMP Lab at the University of Pittsburgh Swanson School of Engineering may have a solution. The lab has created a textile coating that can not only repel liquids like blood and saliva but can also prevent viruses from adhering to the surface. The work was recently published in the journal ACS Applied Materials and Interfaces.

"Recently there's been focus on blood-repellent surfaces, and we were interested in achieving this with mechanical durability," said Anthony Galante, PhD student in industrial engineering at Pitt and lead author of the paper.

[...] What makes the coating unique is its ability to withstand ultrasonic washing, scrubbing and scraping.

[...] "The durability is very important because there are other surface treatments out there, but they're limited to disposable textiles. You can only use a gown or mask once before disposing of it," said Paul Leu, co-author and associate professor of industrial engineering, who leads the LAMP Lab. "Given the PPE shortage, there is a need for coatings that can be applied to reusable medical textiles that can be properly washed and sanitized."

Galante put the new coating to the test, running it through tens of ultrasonic washes, applying thousands of rotations with a scrubbing pad (not unlike what might be used to scour pots and pans), and even scraping it with a sharp razor blade. After each test, the coating remained just as effective.

[...] "As this fabric was already shown to repel blood, protein and bacteria, the logical next step was to determine whether it repels viruses. We chose human adenovirus types 4 and 7, as these are causes of acute respiratory disease as well as conjunctivitis (pink eye)," said Romanowski. [...] As it turned out, the adenoviruses were repelled in a similar way as proteins."

[...] The next step for the researchers will be to test the effectiveness against betacoronaviruses, like the one that causes COVID-19.

Journal Reference:
Anthony J. Galante, Sajad Haghanifar, Eric G. Romanowskiet al. Superhemophobic and Antivirofouling Coating for Mechanically Durable and Wash-Stable Medical Textiles. ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces, 2020; 12 (19): 22120 DOI: 10.1021/acsami.9b23058

Original Submission