N₂O₅ in air discharge plasma: energy-efficient production, maintenance factors and sterilization effects

Abstract

N2O5, a reactive species produced by air discharge plasma, has recently attracted much attention. Due to its high reactivity and solubility, N2O5 is a key molecule in nitrogen fixation processes and exhibits promising prospects in plasma biomedicine. However, thus far, it is not well known how to produce N2O5 efficiently and then maintain its concentration under the action of fast removal reactions. In view of this, N2O5¬ production by dielectric barrier discharge (DBD) alone and by the combination of DBD and gliding arc discharge is compared in this paper. It is found that the combination method can yield over three times the concentration of N2O5 compared to the single DBD method with the optimum discharge power. Moreover, the concentration of N2O5 in the effluent gas can be maintained once O3 also exists because O3 can continually produce N2O5 to compensate for its reduction. Finally, the sterilization effects of both the plasma effluent gas and plasma-activated water (PAW) have trends similar to the trend of the gaseous N2O5 concentration, implying that N2O5 plays an important role in sterilization. This paper enhances the understanding of N2O5 chemistry in air discharge plasma and provides an effective way to produce and maintain N2O5 for subsequent applications.

Inactivation effects of plasma-activated saline prepared by the mixed gases of discharged air and different gases

“…The NO in the PAA could be further oxidized by O 2 to form NO 2 (R5), which resulted in the high absorbance of NO 2 detected by FTIR in the mixed gases of PAA and O 2 . The flow rates of the mixed gases were inversely proportional to the reaction time of the excited nitrogen and O 2 and the lower the flow rate, the more reactive nitrogen species were generated [38]. At the flow rate of 0.8 l min −1 , 1.0 l min −1 , and 1.2 l min −1 , the absorbance peaks of N 2 O 5 and HNO 3 in the mixed gases of PAA and ambient air were higher than in those of PAA and O 2 , which may be due to the nitrogen oxides reacted with the residual water in the ambient air to form HNO 3…”

In vitro Antibacterial Effect Study of Plasma-Activated Saline on Mycobacterium Tuberculosis

“…The high valence NO x radicals in the mixed plasma effluent gas reacted with water to generate large amounts of H + and NO 3 − , resulting in the acidity of PAS, which helps to ensure high bioactivity. 18 Besides, the aqueous H 2 O 2 is likely to originate from the dissolution of gaseous H 2 O 2 , 15 whereas the aqueous NO radicals and NO 2 − have been reported to be produced from gaseous NO 2 . 19 Most importantly, in addition to HNO 3 , the gaseous high valence NO x can generate short-lived aqueous reactive species such as O 2 − and ONOO − , 20 which enables the remarkable chemical and biological reactivity of PAS.…”

“…PAS is produced by the plasma effluent gas enriched with high valence NOx, which is generated by the plasma discharge configuration, similar to our previous studies. 15 The setup comprises two discharge reactors: a sliding electric arc and a coaxial DBD. The sliding electric arc reactor consists of two stainless steel blades positioned opposite each other (minimum distance = 2 mm, blade length = 35 mm) and an air nozzle with an inner diameter of 1 mm.…”

Influence of plasma-treated air on surface microbial communities on freshly harvested lettuce

“…NO* can modify the redox-active cysteine residue of proteins, and subsequently can deactivate them or could react with enzymatic iron-sulfur-complexes ([4Fe-4S]), and hereafter inhibit these enzymes ( Liew and Cox 1991 ; Vázquez-Torres and Bäumler 2016 ). NO 2 , NO and N 2 O 5 are reactive nitrogen species (RNS) that could be generated by non-thermal plasmas ( Chae 2003 , Pankaj et al, 2018 ; Wang et al, 2023 ). NO 2 negatively affected different groups of surface bacteria at different levels ( Janvier et al, 2020 ).…”