Your wound healing anecdote is appreciated, although it doesn’t contribute to our debate.
And that’s the difference between us. My opinion is easily changed by new evidence.
Guys - why do you believe you need to do this.
I am trying to accomplish something that is important to me.
And all there is is assorted flavors of rant and BS about something completely irrelevant. I am on one side of that discussion (the rational one), but you are destroying the thread. And if one of you should meet the others on the street and one is a light bluish green, you will have your answer.
And Silver does have a recognized use as an external antibacterial agent. I just remembered. I believe Silver was pumped up urethras to combat STDs. Sort of internal. I believe it was unpleasant.
Phlogisten and gravelmonkey -
You need to be careful with the terms far UV or far UVC. Mostly people talking about far UV for these things are actually thinking about 254 nm and above. The effect I am talking about I believe needs to get down into the 207 range to work properly. There is a particularly good absorption window at 207 that optimizes the killing effect. My original post said 207 - 254. I have learned more since then. Some earlier work was done up at 220 - 254, but 207 turned out to be a sweet spot for deadly absorption.
Aside from not hurting eyes and skin, the light should not even be visible to most people. It is outside the visual spectral range of our eyes. Some insects and animals can see it (e.g., bees). So it should not be distracting to anyone working in a area lighted with 207 nm. Like a surgeon looking for just the right place to cut; or having to suddenly find the right place to stick a thumb while yelling for a nurse.
To get back on track, alternety here is another open source article you might want to look at Fundamental Characteristics of Deep-UV Light-Emitting Diodes and Their Application To Control Foodborne Pathogens . They are looking at 275nm for microbe killing, more like what you are looking for.
Thanks Scientist.
What I need however is diodes that will work at 207 nm. The wavelength is quite specific. This is the particular sweet spot for killing pathogens and not harming humans in the same space. 207 nm emitters are tough to find. I received some feedback from the people trying to qualify this radiation as a human safe source that kills bugs. This means the whole bunch of crap the FDA requires. The research showing the effectiveness of this radiation is, I believe, at least 5 years old. And it is definitive. This should be something on the FDA fast list. Relatively inexpensive. Immediately reducing a 10% infection rate to zero. Vast reduction of insurance payouts and lawsuits for letting the patient get the diseases in the first place. Using 207 nm UVC throughout the hospital could pretty much eliminate infections within the hospital. In the kind of volume this technique could create (hospitals, homes, any building, automobiles, airports, all other public spaces, food handling sites, etc.) this could drive serious production of the required LEDs and associated hardware with a rapidly declining cost.
The kids will not bring the plague (or other diseases[small pox, whooping cough, measles, flu, etc.]) home from school. Taking an Uber does not give you the flu. Touching things in the supermarket does not give you (fill in the blank). And so on.
Potentially way more effective at thwarting the spread of flu than continuing the years long effort (and cost) of developing and distributing flu vaccines. And all the other transmissible virus, bacteria, and fungus. How can this not be an emergency priority effort by the appropriate agencies, researchers, and manufacturers?
The discovers have done experiments which, in my opinion, should be enough for the FDA approval. The numbers I have seen are that about 10% of people having surgery (particularly within the abdominal cavity) wind up with a hospital provided infection. Since antibiotic resistant bugs are most common in hospitals, the scenario gets worse. Survival rate from Hospital Acquired Infection ((HAI) is not good. Current technology simply does not fix this. The UV they use is not permitted with humans in the room.
A POSSIBLE >= 10% REDUCTION IN HOSPITAL INFECTIONS - THINK OF THE HUMAN LIVES AND COST TO EVERYONE.
I am trying hard to find a way to eliminate the 10% risk for surgery. I am old, have a seriously nasty “rip my abdomen open and muck about” problem with a high likelihood or recurrence.
And this solution is plodding through acceptance tests.
It is a life changing technology.
Sorry to read about your condition and thanks for bringing up this matter. Quite an interesting read.
One thing i would actually worry about is over using this kind of technology though. If you grow up in a sterile environment you are likely to get sick with about anything if you wander into the ‘real world’… But of course it would be a big improvement for a lot of such applications. I hope it starts to get deployed in hospitals soon.
Do you think that your idea and implementation is something that makers of UVC packages for hospitals have not thought of?
Seems like companies such as www.americanultraviolet.com would have all of the answers and knowledge that you are seeking.
Yes they make UVC lamps for hospitals. But they are probably working around 254 nm. This is dangerous to people. My understanding is that 207 use is not yet approved by the FDA.
One problem with using light to sterilize is, it can’t get everywhere.
That is indeed true.
However, a significant factor in preventing surgical infection is the fact that the UVC will blow things out of the air.
In a surgical situation, most (if not all) of the tools and materials being used have been sterilized. More UV can’t hurt, and could improve the results. But a major element of contamination is airborne. Even with air filtration and sterilization protocols. Or a few contaminates from someone’s hair, nose, shoes, fingernails, breathing, and on and on. All these things can be a useful attack vector for UVC (207 nm).
The other application is to provide a localized source to protect the patient from pathogenic crap to be imported by nurses, family visits, food delivery persons, stethoscopes, the bed linen, water cups, blood pressure cuffs, IV insertions, not always really effectively washing hands, unfiltered air in the room, contagion of linen (e.g., would you like a blanket?), bed pans, just touching the bed or tray, and any other material effectively exposed to the surgical site. The potential contamination from just a few little tiny microbes can kill you. The personnel, equipment, the environment are simply not suitably disinfected.
Thinking how to create a completely sterile environment can hurt your head. But it is unlikely will you will figure out and block everything that is trying to kill the patient. And a hospital room simply cannot protect you.
You should consider 222nm lamps for a variety of reasons. We are working towards FDA approval for cornea disinfection.
Also show 99.99% air disinfection “kill-on-the-fly” single pass in an HVAC unit. UVC get’s less than 1%.
Good luck.
Just a note. As noted by Far-UV, I believe 222nm is going to be the target. I have not seen any useful semiconductor products at that frequency That certainly does not mean there are none. Or won’t be. The technology seems to be plasma discharge. This requires high voltage power supplies.
Far-UV. I am curious why the 222 nm radiation has to be approved for such a specific use. From what I have seen there is quite enough research to validate that the 222 nm radiation causes no harm to human surfaces. There are commercial devices outside the US. Why should it have to be approved for each human part in the US?
I am so excited about this technology. Here is a company claiming to have UVC LED capable of emitting any “single wavelength”. optical bypass filters can also be used to narrow wavelength to the desired frequency long as it emittes uv within the range one is looking for. The other factor to control is the intensity of the UVC.
Hi. I have been unable to get my computers to actually work for the last month and a half. One working. Go Microsoft; or simply be sent to Hell.
I am not sure if you are talking about another source or what I have posted. If you have new information; please post a link.
There have been multiple situations with hospitals hiding the fact that dangerous biologics are loose in hospitals (secure treatment areas, simple hospitalization and homes). Bad air is a significant component of spreading the diseases. No satisfactory methods are available for protecting patients, visitors, bed components, room contamination, nurses and other workers marching through the room touching everything. It goes on.
We are activity causing the propagation of human death so pigs and chickens can get big and inexpensive.
Was googling for affordable 222nm bulbs. Most are 254 nm and the search landed me at this forum.
Wan’t going to reply because I need to create a new account.
Then I realized that you did reply to a 2018 thread in 2020.
Anyway, I created the account so that I could reply with this link:
They have a 222nm uvc lamp, but I think their business is to sell expensive products, so it would be costly.
Hope it might be helpful, and hope your health is better now.
Still searching for 222nm products that I can DIY. The 254 nm ones are quite affordable, but I have to be out of the room to be safe.
I’m also interested in this, given recent events.
It seems like lasers and optical frequency doubling may be one way to do it. I’m not familiar with optics, need to spend more time learning.
I know this is an old thread, but I saw the discussion about Far UV-C lighting.
Here is a company who is starting to build these devices.
I just happened to send them an email earlier today with an inquiry into purchasing options.
I doubt that any products can be had immediately, but this was the most promising company I have seen for the Excimer bulbs which fit within the range you mentioned.
Good luck with your medical situation.
UV light is only line kill of sight except 185nm uv which also creates ozone as well as corona discharge units and ozone gas will find its way into every crevice. Ozone levels max are .8ppm and 5ppm is considered immediately dangerous So you can use ozone only if no living thing is is the room that can be harmed [includes plants] and you are willing to wait for the ozone levels to dissapate [1/2 life if 20 to 30 minutes]. an alternative is a Hydroxyl generator of OH generator which uses a UVC light with titantium dioxide coated filter or zinc coated mesh with moist air. Nanoparticle TiO2 and ZnO provide the greatest surface area and both metal are photocatalytic especially with humid air. UV light striking the metals produce OH ions aka Hydroxyl ions which float around in the air and destroy smoke and bacteria, etc. While there is some discussion that some VOCs can be broken down into equally hazardous byproducts, Hydroxyl generators are considered far safer than ozone generators and are used my many restoration companies that need to be working while the air is being decontaminated.
As far as the 207 to 222 nm uv being safe for human skin and eyes, this is true though counterintuitive since 222nm is a shorter wavelength than 254 uvc lamps so 222 would be more energetic and one would assume for it to be more damaging, but research has shown multiple times for Far uv of 297 to 222 to be safe. the researcher has suggested it might find use in surgeries to keep open wound from being infected by aerosol pathogens but not sure he has studied direct effects on tissue other than skin and eyes
You did not mention the company making these uvc leds? Most of the 60 watt uvc leds on amazon are fake, they just juse light blue leds to look like uvc but several utubes are out there with guys that have UV meters and these register no uvc no uvb or uva, too bad