A Novel Approach to Understanding Viral Aerosol Stability

ELIZABETH A. KLUG, Danielle N. Rivera, Don Collins, Ningjin Xu, Sean Kinahan, St. Patrick Reid, Daniel N. Ackerman, Ashley R. Ravnholdt, Vicki Herrera, Joshua L. Santarpia, University of Nebraska Medical Center (UNMC)

     Abstract Number: 6
     Working Group: Aerosol Science of Infectious Diseases: Lessons and Open Questions on Models, Transmission and Mitigation

Abstract
Viral diseases pose a significant risk to the general public. This is especially true of viruses that transmit as aerosols due to the potential for widespread disease transmission. These viral diseases may be transmitted from person-to-person, such as SARS-CoV-2, or as environmentally generated aerosols, like hantaviruses.

The threat a virus may pose as an aerosol depends on several factors, including its stability as an aerosol. Bioaerosol stability is generally studied as the decay of aerosol properties (viability/infectivity, detectability, etc.) in response to environmental conditions (sunlight, relative humidity, etc.). However, there is little understanding of how intrinsic viral properties drive this stability. To investigate and determine the aerosol and viral properties that drive the stability of viruses that infect humans as aerosols, we have developed a novel system and approach to the study of bioaerosol stability. The Biological Aerosol Reaction Chamber (Bio-ARC) is a flow-through system designed to rapidly expose biological aerosols to environmental conditions (ozone, simulated sunlight (UV), temperature, and humidity) and determine the sensitivity of those particles to simulated ambient conditions. Using this system, we examined the stability of a well-understood model organism: Bacteriophage MS2. In future work, we aim to better understand the key factors that determine viral stability and to better predict the stability of emerging viral diseases that pose a threat as an aerosol.