A bioactive paper can detect and ward off life-threatening bacteria and viruses like E-coli, salmonella, and SARS.
This low-cost, easy-to-use, paper-based product with biologically active chemicals can protect the public against increasing incidents of food-, water-, and air-borne illnesses, according to researchers from 10 universities across Canada, nine industry partners, and federal and provincial government agencies that formed a research consortium called the SENTINEL Bioactive Paper Network.
Products that could use bioactive paper include food packaging that signals the presence of E. coli and salmonella; hospital masks that detect and deactivate harmful air-borne viruses such as SARS; dipsticks that can detect and purify unsafe drinking water; and paper strips that can check for banned pesticides on produce.
The bioactive paper idea stemmed from conversations Robert Pelton, scientific director of SENTINEL and a professor of chemical engineering at McMaster University who specializes in pulp-and-paper research, had with colleagues in 2004. Those talks came about after the SARS outbreak that killed 44 Canadians and hundreds globally, and the anthrax scare in the U.S.
“What bioactive paper will offer are immediacy, portability, and low-cost in detecting and repelling or deactivating harmful pathogens,” Pelton said. “Right now, it can take days or weeks to get samples to a lab, diagnose the problem, and get the remedy into the field.”
The prevalence of food-, air-, and water-borne illness occurs more than you think. There are 76-million food-borne illnesses annually in the U.S., resulting in over 325,000 hospitalizations, 5,000 deaths, and $7 billion U.S. in medical costs; 1.6 million diarrhoel deaths annually due to unsafe water, sanitation, and hygiene; 1 billion people who lack access to an improved water source.
Key to developing bioactive-paper products is the ability to merge advances in biochemistry with current paper-production processes. Researchers are investigating the development of a bioactive ‘ink,’ which would allow researchers to print, coat, or impregnate biologically active chemicals onto or into paper using current paper-making and high-speed printing processes.
“The development of bioactive paper holds potential benefits for the paper products industry as well,” says George Rosenberg, managing director of SENTINEL. “It provides our industrial partners with the opportunity to develop innovative, high value-added paper and packaging products.”
For related information, go to www.isa.org/sensors.