Electron Disinfestation/Sterilization of Powders and Aggregates Using Pneumatic Transfer

The sterilization of powders and disinfestation of aggregates using existing technology present difficult product handling problems and often unacceptable economics. Ethylene Oxide is widely used for this purpose, while the alternate non-chemical (physical) processes of heat and gamma - radiations are expensive and frequently result in unacceptable damage to the product. The proposed program will provide a proof of principle demonstration of the practicability of using pneumatic transfer of these materials to present them in an efficient manner to low energy electron beams. These self-shielded energy sources can provide adequate beam power levels to provide very high throughputs. The present demonstration system will be utilized at under 3 kilowatts output and modest gas flow velocities (30-150 m/minute) with powder loading factors in the air stream of a few percent. The test will be conducted using both dose and the air stream powder loading factor as independent variables. The assembly and testing of the self-contained product handling system constitutes a major part of the program effort with the conduct of the experiments (includig microbiological assays) representing a lessor part of the work. The remainder is in data processing and reporting. The objective is to demonstrate the efficacy of this physical process of known microbial challenge for powders aggregates at several stream loading factors so that industrial level designs can be made for processors in this voltage range 0.1-0.3 Mv).