Reuse of medical face masks in domestic and community settings without sacrificing safety: Ecological and economical lessons from the Covid-19 pandemic

The need for personal protective equipment increased exponentially in response to the Covid-19 pandemic. To cope with the mask shortage during springtime 2020, a French consortium was created to find ways to reuse medical and respiratory masks in healthcare departments. The consortium addressed the complex context of the balance between cleaning medical masks in a way that maintains their safety and functionality for reuse, with the environmental advantage to manage medical disposable waste despite the current mask designation as single-use by the regulatory frameworks. We report a Workflow that provides a quantitative basis to determine the safety and efficacy of a medical mask that is decontaminated for reuse. The type IIR polypropylene medical masks can be washed up to 10 times, washed 5 times and autoclaved 5 times, or washed then sterilized with radiations or ethylene oxide, without any degradation of their filtration or breathability properties. There is loss of the antiprojection properties. The Workflow rendered the medical masks to comply to the AFNOR S76-001 standard as “type 1 non-sanitory usage masks”. This qualification gives a legal status to the Workflow-treated masks and allows recommendation for the reuse of washed medical masks by the general population, with the significant public health advantage of providing better protection than cloth-tissue masks. Additionally, such a legal status provides a basis to perform a clinical trial to test the masks in real conditions, with full compliance with EN 14683 norm, for collective reuse. The rational reuse of medical mask and their end-of-life management is critical, particularly in pandemic periods when decisive turns can be taken. The reuse of masks in the general population, in industries, or in hospitals (but not for surgery) has significant advantages for the management of waste without degrading the safety of individuals wearing reused masks

Overexpression of plastidial thioredoxins f and m differentially alters photosynthetic activity and response to oxidative stress in tobacco plants

Plants display a remarkable diversity of thioredoxins (Trxs), reductases controlling the thiol redox status of proteins. The physiological function of many of them remains elusive, particularly for plastidial Trxs f and m, which are presumed based on biochemical data to regulate photosynthetic reactions and carbon metabolism. Recent reports revealed that Trxs f and m participate in vivo in the control of starch metabolism and cyclic photosynthetic electron transfer around photosystem I, respectively. To further delineate their in planta function, we compared the photosynthetic characteristics, the level and/or activity of various Trx targets and the responses to oxidative stress in transplastomic tobacco plants overexpressing either Trx f or Trx m. We found that plants overexpressing Trx m specifically exhibit altered growth, reduced chlorophyll content, impaired photosynthetic linear electron transfer and decreased pools of glutathione and ascorbate. In both transplastomic lines, activities of two enzymes involved in carbon metabolism, NADP-malate dehydrogenase and NADP-glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate dehydrogenase are markedly and similarly altered. In contrast, plants overexpressing Trx m specifically display increased capacity for methionine sulfoxide reductases, enzymes repairing damaged proteins by regenerating methionine from oxidized methionine. Finally, we also observed that transplastomic plants exhibit distinct responses when exposed to oxidative stress conditions generated by methyl viologen or exposure to high light combined with low temperature, the plants overexpressing Trx m being notably more tolerant than Wt and those overexpressing Trx f. Altogether, these data indicate that Trxs f and m fulfill distinct physiological functions. They prompt us to propose that the m type is involved in key processes linking photosynthetic activity, redox homeostasis and antioxidant mechanisms in the chloroplast.Peer Reviewe

Plasma polymerized thin coating as a protective layer of carbon nanotubes grafted on carbon fibers

International audienceNanoparticles addition is widely studied to improve properties of carbon fiber reinforced composites. Here, hybrid carbon fiber results from grafting of carbon nanotubes (CNT) by Chemical Vapor Deposition (CVD) on the carbon fiber for mechanical reinforcement and conductive properties. Both tows and woven fabrics made of the hybrid fibers are added to the matrix for composite processing. However handling hybrid fibers may induce unwilling health risk due to eventual CNT release and a protective layer is required. A thin coating layer is deposited homogeneously by low pressure plasma polymerization of an organic monomer without modifying the morphology and the organization of grafted CNTs. The polymeric layer effect on the electrical behavior of hybrid fiber is assessed by conductivity measurements. Its influence on the mechanical properties is also studied regarding the interface adhesion between fiber and matrix. The protective role of layer is demonstrated by means of friction constraints applied to the hybrid fiber

A novel thioredoxin-like protein located in the chloroplast is induced by water deficit in Solanum tuberosum L. plants

International audienc

Surface treatment by RF cold plasma on polyester fibres used in chemically bonded nonwovens and consequence on adhesion between fibre and binder.

Nonwovens (NW) are innovative textile materials and can be used in many fields including medical, hygiene, transport, civil engineering, etc.. They are sheet-like fabrics made up of fiber webs which are bonded either chem., mech. or thermally. Among all consolidation methods, chem.-bonded-NW are still widely used because of the extended range of binder flexibility, durability and the versatility of their final properties. The purpose of the present study is to investigate surface treatment by Radio Frequency (RF) cold plasma on polyester fibers in order to improve the adhesion mechanism with copolymer acrylic binders, the ultimate aim being to limit the amts. of chem. binder used for environmental and economical reasons. The phys. modifications on fiber surface are examd. using at. force microscopy (AFM), and the chem. modifications are discussed after surface anal. of fibers by XPS. The pull-out test was used to characterize the interfacial shear strength between fiber and matrix

Effect of spin finish on fiber/binder adhesion in chemically bonded nonwovens.

International audienceThe purpose of this study is to better understand the mechanisms governing the phenomena of fiber/matrix adhesion by controlling the fiber surface properties. This adhesion is evaluated by studying the micromech. and thermodynamical behavior of the fiber/matrix interface. The complexity of the interactions at the interface requires a global approach that takes into account the chem., morphol., and mechanics. The thermodynamical affinity between the binder and fibers is evaluated by the wetting behavior, whereas the mech. resistance of the fiber/matrix interface is characterized with the pull-out test. Three distinct approaches are used to classify the different systems according to the nature of the binder and the fiber surface. It is found that there is better adhesion when the spin finish is removed from the fibers, revealing the surface roughness on which the latex can mech. anchor

Effect of melt spinning on the integrity of poly(ether ether ketone) for commingled yarn based composite preforms

International audiencePEEK yarns are used for commingled yarn based preforms in order to manufacture high performance thermoplastic composites. In a previous work, characterizations of PEEK commingled yarns revealed degradation, causing poor consolidation of final composites. The sizing applied onto the yarn surface in the melt spinning was identified as a degradation factor. Thus, the aim of this work is to assess the effect of different melt spinning parameters: extrusion, sizing and draw ratio, on PEEK integrity and its degradation process. Yarns at different stages of melt spinning were characterized through various techniques. For all yarns, degradation was identified during further transformation, in the molten state, inducing a decrease of the crystallization temperature and an increase of viscosity due to crosslinking. Extrusion initiates degradation earlier without changing the PEEK decomposition process. Sizing is responsible for an acceleration and modifications of degradation steps

An optimized design for an intelligent walking-aid

International audienc

The Arabidopsis thaliana sulfiredoxin is a plastidic cysteine-sulfinic acid reductase involved in the photooxidative stress response

International audienc

Polymer nanoparticles to decrease thermal conductivity of phase change materials

Microparticles including paraffin are currently used for textiles coating in order to deaden thermal shocks. We will show that polymer nanoparticles embedded in those microsized capsules allow for decreasing the thermal conductivity of the coating and enhance the protection in the stationary regime. A reasonable volume fraction of polymer nanoparticles reduces the conductivity more than predicted by Maxwell mixing rules. Besides, measurements prove that the polymer nanoparticles do not affect the latent heat and even improve the phase change behaviour as well as the mechanical properties