Antibacterial Effect of Spark-generated Titanium Particles Deposited on Glass Fiber Filters

Yang Seon Kim (1), Jae Hong Park (1), Jungho Hwang (1)

(1) School of Mechanical Engineering, Yonsei University

     Abstract Number: 875
     Last modified: August 11, 2010

Abstract


Titanium nanoparticles were coated onto glass fiber filter using a spark discharge method. A mixture of nitrogen and oxygen mixture gas was used as the carrier gas, and its total volume flow rate was 2.5 l/min. The mole fraction of oxygen in the carrier gas was controlled as 0, 0.2, 0.8 and 1. Titanium nanoparticles via a spark discharger of various carrier gas conditions were characterized with a scanning mobility particle sizer (SMPS) and a field emission scanning electron microscope (FE-SEM) analysis. The total number concentration of generated particles was 2.5x10$^7 particles/cm$^3. The mode diameter of titanium nanoparticles which were produced without using oxygen was 32.62nm. However, as the oxygen rate increased to 0.2, 0.8 and 1, mode diameters of titanium nanoparticles increased to 36.8, 41.5 and 48.1 nm, respectively. Antibacterial tests were performed using the disc diffusion method, with E. coli used as the test bacteria. The pristine glass fiber filter did not show any antimicrobial performance. However, for the titanium deposited filters, when the oxygen gas rate increased, the inhibition diameter increased to 13mm (the maximum diameter).