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STUDY OF THERMAL DESTRUCTION OF BACILLUS ANTHRACIS SURROGATES SPIKED ON BUILDING MATERIALS
Citation:
LEE, C., J. WOOD, D. BETANCOURT, W. P. LINAK, P. M. LEMIEUX, T. R. DEAN, M. Y. MENETREZ, AND J. NOVAK. STUDY OF THERMAL DESTRUCTION OF BACILLUS ANTHRACIS SURROGATES SPIKED ON BUILDING MATERIALS. Presented at A&WMA 98th Annual Conference & Exhibition, Minneapolis, MN, June 21 - 24, 2005.
Impact/Purpose:
To inform the public.
Description:
A significant amount of contaminated material may need to be disposed of after a bioterrorism attack. The efficacy of disposal of building materials contaminated with biological agents by incineration is complicated by matrix effects associated with the contaminant and the material it is on. It is important to know the relative difficulty of destroying these biological agents bound to different materials. This project examines the thermal destruction of surrogate biological agents that are present on several common building materials including ceiling tiles and wallboard. A laboratory-scale thermal reactor was constructed to examine the effect of building material, heating temperature and residence time on the destruction of Bacillus anthracis surrogates. Results of the study showed that the destruction of the Bacillus anthracis surrogates, Bacillus subtilis and Geobacillus stearothermophilus spiked on building materials strongly depends on the type of material and time-temperature history of the simulants in the reactor.