In this report, we demonstrate that CD spectroscopy can be used as a tool to detect changes to DNA upon irradiation with UV light. We follow the spectroscopic response of DNA samples irradiated at selected exposure times with both CD and UV-Vis spectroscopy. We analyzed four different nucleic acids to evaluate the effect of the sequence on photodegradation.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIntroduction Electrosurgery exposes healthcare workers to volatile organic compounds (VOCs) including formaldehyde. Adopting electrosurgical devices that catalytically transform formaldehyde to benign substances has the potential to improve safety in surgical settings. Materials and methods We compared the efficiency of formaldehyde removal of two medical devices.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFElectrosurgery procedures produce airborne contaminants including volatile organic compounds (VOCs). The effectiveness of commercial grade activated carbon at removing toluene, a typical VOC, from the air in an enclosed simulated operating room (OR) when interfaced with an air recirculation device was tested. The concentration of toluene in the air was measured using gas sensitive semiconductor VOC sensors.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe air in an operating room becomes more contaminated as the occupancy of the room increases. Individuals residing in a room can potentially emit infectious agents. In order to inhibit and better understand the epidemiology of surgical site infections, it is important to develop procedures to track room occupancy level and respiration.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: The main objective of this study was to assess the sanitary measures of operating theaters using next-generation sequencing.
Methods: Air was sampled from the operating room for the whole duration of 10 surgical days of "clean" (no infection cases) procedures (6 hip/knee arthroplasty and 4 spine cases). Controls consisted of samples at the beginning of the day (1 hour before the surgery started) and at the end of the day after terminal cleaning.