Inactivation rates for airborne human coronavirus by low doses of 222nm far-UVC radiation

Date published

2022-03-25

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Journal ISSN

Volume Title

Publisher

MDPI

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Type

Article

ISSN

1999-4915

Format

Citation

Welch D, Buonanno M, Buchan AG, et al., (2022) Inactivation rates for airborne human coronavirus by low doses of 222nm far-UVC radiation, Viruses, Volume 14, Issue 4, March 2022, Article number 684

Abstract

Recent research using UV radiation with wavelengths in the 200–235 nm range, often referred to as far-UVC, suggests that the minimal health hazard associated with these wavelengths will allow direct use of far-UVC radiation within occupied indoor spaces to provide continuous disinfection. Earlier experimental studies estimated the susceptibility of airborne human coronavirus OC43 exposed to 222-nm radiation based on fitting an exponential dose–response curve to the data. The current study extends the results to a wider range of doses of 222 nm far-UVC radiation and uses a computational model coupling radiation transport and computational fluid dynamics to improve dosimetry estimates. The new results suggest that the inactivation of human coronavirus OC43 within our exposure system is better described using a bi-exponential dose–response relation, and the estimated susceptibility constant at low doses—the relevant parameter for realistic low dose rate exposures—was 12.4 ± 0.4 cm2/mJ, which described the behavior of 99.7% ± 0.05% of the virus population. This new estimate is more than double the earlier susceptibility constant estimates that were based on a single-exponential dose response. These new results offer further evidence as to the efficacy of far-UVC to inactivate airborne pathogens.

Description

Software Description

Software Language

Github

Keywords

ultraviolet radiation, far-UVC, coronavirus, airborne, radiation transport, computational fluid dynamics

DOI

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Attribution 4.0 International

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Funder/s

EPSRC: EP/M022684/2 and Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC): IRCPJ 549979-19.