Home » Science & Nature » Microbiology » More Than One Way to Kill Anthrax Spores

More Than One Way to Kill Anthrax Spores

© Neal Rolfe Chamberlain

Plenty has been said about Bacillus anthracis, the bacterium that causes anthrax. This bacterium has been used to terrorize people for a long time. One of the most recent strategies was to put spores of this bacterium in the mail. Several people died and many more were placed on antibiotics in hopes of killing the organism before it could cause anymore harm. These events of 2001 seem to be ancient history and all but forgotten by the media. However, forgotten memories of past events do not eliminate the threat of future terrorists mail attacks.

This threat still remains because there are very few solutions available to kill the very hardy spores in a letter. The best means of killing spores involves burning or autoclaving the letters. Burning the mail will kill the spores if done in a contained unit that does not allow incompletely burned mail from escaping into the air. Unfortunately, this process really inhibits the process of actually reading the mail we get in our mailboxes. Autoclaving uses steam heat and high pressure to get the temperature high enough to kill the organisms. This is also very destructive of the printed word and is not practical for treating high volumes of mail.

Currently proposed methods of killing the spores involve the use of radioactive sources that emit gamma rays, microwaves or electron beam guns that send electrons into the mail. These methods use the gamma rays, microwaves or electron beams to hit the spores' DNA and destroy it. Damaged DNA leads to death of the spores. These methods do not result in radioactive, microwave-rich or electron-rich mail. However, there are always possibilities of accidents and exposure of people to the radioactivity. Microwaves have been blamed for various diseases and electron beams could potentially cause damage to humans if used carelessly. These solutions to decontaminating the mail maybe effective but are expensive. One estimate of the price for radioactive decontamination figures each letter would cost one penny more to send through the mail.

Recently a group of researchers at Pennsylvania State University (Penn State) found that ultrasound can kill spores. Ultrasound is different than these other methods. High frequency sound waves are used to destroy the bacteria. Many people are exposed everyday to ultrasound without any harmful effects. Pregnant women's fetuses are examined with ultrasound. People with potential heart problems can be examined using ultrasound. This is a noninvasive painless way of checking out what is going on inside our bodies. The only down side is that blue gel stuff that they have to place all over you for the ultrasound to work correctly. What a mess!