AAAR 36th Annual Conference October 16 - October 20, 2017 Raleigh Convention Center Raleigh, North Carolina, USA
Abstract View
Airborne Inactivation of Bacteriophage MS2 by a Packed Bed Dielectric Barrier Discharge Non-thermal Plasma
TIAN XIA, Abby Kleinheksel, Eric Monsu Lee, Zhong Qiao, Krista Wigginton, Herek Clack, University of Michigan
Abstract Number: 410 Working Group: Bioaerosols
Abstract Transmitted diseases are one of the greatest threats to modern agriculture and food security, reducing crop yields, diminishing animal productivity and increasing animal mortality. The building construction, air flows, and indoor volumes that typify existing animal confinement buildings present multiple challenges to the implementation of HEPA filtration or UV germicidal irradiation for preventing infectious disease transmission in ventilation air. A packed bed dielectric barrier discharge (DBD) non-thermal plasma reactor was designed and constructed for the purpose of developing a novel airstream disinfection technology. Bacteriophage MS2 was aerosolized by a nebulizer and suspended in an air flow that passed through the reactor. Two impingers sampled the virus-loaded air flow at both upstream and downstream positions in the reactor, and the samples were subjected to plaque assay and quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) analyses to determine the pre- and post-treatment abundance of infective MS2 (from plaque assay) as compared with the abundance of the viral genome (from qPCR), whether infective or rendered inactive. The results indicated that at a constant air flow rate of 171 liters per minute using a fixed 30 kV power supply, the reactor can achieve over 2.3 log reduction in infective MS2 by inactivation and ~0.35 log reduction in the abundance of the MS2 genome by physical filtration. With a variable 20 kV power supply, inactivation effectiveness varied proportionally with applied power, the highest inactivation efficiency reaching 90%. Ozone was generated by the reactor, but an ozone filter installed downstream of the reactor effectively counteracted the ozone increase and maintained ozone concentrations near the regulated levels applicable to indoor air cleaners. With further optimization, non-thermal plasma can be a viable technology for airstream disinfection and prevention of airborne disease transmission.