SBIR-STTR Award

The specific goals of this proposed project is to develop a system capable of integrating into existing building infrastructure for the specific purpose of protecting against chemical and biological attacks. Significant progress has been made in the detection of chemical and biological agents as well as their destruction in bulk processing. There still exists a significant lack of technology to protect a building or similar large infrastructure in the event of a release of an agent. Current ventilation designs are vulnerable to attacks from either outside the building or from within. If an agent were introduced at the air handler?s makeup or return air, the building would quickly distribute the agent throughout the building with little or no impediment. This was demonstrated by the attack on the Tokyo subway system several years ago. PlasmaSol proposes developing an air filtration system, which would destroy chemical and biological agents. The results and benefits of this project will be the development of a new technique for the safe, quick and inexpensive remediation of chemical and biological threats to buildings. The target goals of this project include the development of an effective air cleaning system at a price in production which could be easily integrated into the national infrastructure

The events of 11 September 2001 and the weeks that followed have changed standard perceptions and priorities relative to threats of terrorism conducted with conventional, biological and possibly other weapons of mass destruction. These events have highlighted the need for new technologies to meet these challenges, providing a protective shield to military personnel, first responders and the general public. The specific goals of this proposed project is to develop a portable air sterilizer capable of protecting against chemical and biological attacks. At the end of this phase II, it is envisioned that a small, lightweight air cleaner capable of dealing with chemical and biological releases will be designed using non thermal plasma as a mechanism to facilitate biological and chemical destruction. Current force protection relies upon trapping technology which can often concentrate a problem as opposed to remediating a situation after a release. The proposed technology is an active response to chemical and biological threats. In phase I, the proof of concept was demonstrated. In phase II we will scale the unit up to a viable engineering system and test against a variety of toxic compounds and pathogens.