Microbiology Commons^™

Mechanism Of Virus Inactivation By Cold Atmospheric-Pressure Plasma And Plasma-Activated Water, Li Guo, Ruobing Xu, Lu Gou, Zhichao Liu, Yiming Zhao, Dingxin Liu, Lei Zhang, Hailan Chen, Michael G. Kong

Bioelectrics Publications

ABSTRACT Viruses cause serious pathogenic contamination that severely affects the environment and human health. Cold atmospheric-pressure plasma efficiently inactivates pathogenic bacteria; however, the mechanism of virus inactivation by plasma is not fully understood. In this study, surface plasma in argon mixed with 1% air and plasma-activated water was used to treat water containing bacteriophages. Both agents efficiently inactivated bacteriophages T4, ϕ174, and MS2 in a time-dependent manner. Prolonged storage had marginal effects on the antiviral activity of plasma-activated water. DNA and protein analysis revealed that the reactive species generated by plasma damaged both nucleic acids and proteins, consistent with the …