Generation of Oxygen Plasma using Plasma-based Ion Implantation and its Application to Sterilization of Spore-forming Bacteria

Abstract

As a sterilization technique, the hydrogen peroxide plasma sterilization is generally used. The hydrogen peroxide plasma sterilization can not be used in food sterilization for the use of toxic hydrogen peroxide. Example of other sterilization techniques, the atmospheric pressure plasma sterilization has been attempted. By the way, studies have been attempted for application to sterilization techniques of PBII technology. Application to medical equipment is considered, because it uses harmless nitrogen or oxygen gas to sterilization using PBII. Sterilization using PBII is possible processing a short time at low temperatures.  In this study, using the PBII sterilization technique using a harmless gas, the authors tried the application to the sterilization of food. Therefore, the authors examined the plasma generation technology suitable for the sterilization process by the measurement of the spectrum. Increase in the number of ions in the plasma was observed with the combination of RF burst plasma and self-ignited plasma. The authors evaluated sterilization processing by the number of living bacteria of the spore bearing bacterium about only self-ignition plasma and the combination of RF burst plasma and self-ignited plasma.