Cold Plasma: Clean Technology to Destroy Pathogenic Micro-organisms

Atmospheric pressure cold plasma is a promising technology in fighting pathogenic micro-organisms. In times of Covid-19 pandemic, we have decided to modify two types of cold plasma devices to study their effectiveness in the killing of pathogenic micro-organisms. Our studies have shown that both the devices are efficient in this purpose. While pencil like microwave based device can destroy Aeromonas bacteria and bacteriophage from 6 cm distance in 2 minutes, the larger (~ 40 cm2) RF plasma based device could do the similar killing ability for the larger possible area in 4 minutes. OES studies revealed that both these device produce OH radicals which helped in the destruction of both bacteria and bacteriophage. With suitable modification, these devices, especially the larger area device may even be implemented for the elimination of Covid-19 affected wards of hospital without using any sensitive chemical process.