Speaker
Description
The polymeric materials are extensively being employed for the various applications such as health care, storage, packaging materials for the foods, beverages, and saline etc. The most commonly used polymer in these applications are polyethylene terephthalate (PET) silicone rubber, polyurethane, due to their flexibility, low cost, biocompatible nature and other properties. However, these polymeric materials are often need to be sterilize with ionizing radiations for all possible applications and enhancing shelf-life of liquids stored in the containers made-up of these polymeric materials. Microplastic / Nanoplastics have be released by these polymeric materials in contact with aqueous fluids in over a period of long exposure. Thus released microplastics / nanopalstics pose the health hazards, may act as carrier of host of pathogens, may protect pathogens during sterilization and may also accumulate toxic elements. The extent of microplastic release can depend on factors such as the composition of material, sterilization method, and sterilization conditions. The ionizing radiations used for the sterilizations are expected to produce the changes in polymeric materials such as polymer chains scission and cross-linking depending upon the doses and dose rates. It is likely that these changes in the polymeric materials may enhance or suppress the microplastic release after sterilization when exposed to aqueous solutions. The microplastics significant release has been observed in the E-Beam Irradiated polymeric materials at 100 kGy dose (E-beam Energy: 3.5 MeV, E-Beam Current (Pulse Current) 250 mA, E-Beam Average Current: 1mA). This was attributed to E-Beam induced damage to the polymer matrix and formation of the particles as observed by Atomic Force Microscopy(AFM) in the surface morphology studies of the irradiated samples. Studies on microplastic release from PET after E-Beam irradiations, and subsequent implications of microplastics release as pathogen host and carriers has been carried out.
Key words: PET, E-Beam, Microplastic, Surface Morphology, AFM.
