Biological decontamination by nonthermal plasmas

Nonthermal gaseous discharges have been found to be effective agents for biological decontamination/sterilization. The ability to generate these discharges at atmospheric pressure makes the decontamination process practical and inexpensive. In addition, the fact that the plasmas generated by such discharges are cold makes their use suitable for applications where medium preservation is desired. To fully understand the biophysical and biochemical processes induced by the interaction of living cells with gaseous discharges, a multidisciplinary approach is required. In this paper, we present two studies on bacteria killing obtained by two different discharges: a glow discharge at atmospheric pressure and an enhanced corona discharge at atmospheric pressure.