Project description
A quick solution to protect against the spread of bacteria
Any public surface can be treated with a special compound that kills any bacteria that it comes into contact with. Such antimicrobial covers have been in great demand since the COVID-19 pandemic. Also, nosocomial infections cause thousands of deaths each year in Europe. With all this in mind, the ERC-funded SAFE-ON project will bring to market its smart antimicrobial coatings. This entails the preparation of two antimicrobial coatings based on commercial formulations used in catheters and doorhandle covers (one based on hydrogels and the other, on silicone), and subsequent testing of their antimicrobial capacity. The project will test two prototypes: a coated catheter and a doorhandle cover.
Objective
Infectious diseases are a rapidly growing threat to humanity. For instance, the current COVID-19 pandemic, caused by the virus SARS-CoV-2, has already killed over 4.5 million people since 2019 and is taking a devastating socioeconomic toll around the world. Similarly, nosocomial infections are among the major causes of death and increased morbidity, causing thousands of deaths every year in Europe. Recently, the use of antimicrobial coatings has garnered increasing interest as a simple prophylactic strategy to combat these infectious diseases. In this PoC project, we aim advancing a new patented antimicrobial coating technology called SAFE-ON, into the pre-commercial stage, with the aim of demonstrating its breakthrough innovation potential and approaching its arrival to market.
The first part of this project encompasses optimization of SAFE-ON technology as highly efficient, smart antimicrobial coatings. This entails the preparation of two antimicrobial coatings based on commercial formulations used in catheters and door-handle covers (one based on hydrogels and the other, on silicone), and subsequent testing of their antimicrobial capacity. It also involves preparing the first two SAFE-ON prototypes: one coated catheter and one door-handle cover. The second part of SAFE-ON will be dedicated to intellectual property (IP) and market aspects needed for the pre-commercialization of this new technology for antimicrobial coatings. This study will include a freedom-to-operate analysis and a market study to identify the antimicrobial coating producers that could ultimately serve as manufacturing partners.
In this project we will design, fabricate and evaluate two innovative prototypes incorporating our iodine delivery platform, with the aim to assess the commercial viability of with antimicrobial SAFE-ON coatings, accelerate their market entry and ultimately, commercialize and further develop antimicrobial coatings and other biocide products based on our technology.
Fields of science
- natural sciencesbiological sciencesmicrobiologyvirology
- medical and health scienceshealth sciencespublic healthepidemiologypandemics
- medical and health scienceshealth sciencesinfectious diseasesRNA virusescoronaviruses
- engineering and technologymaterials engineeringcoating and films
- natural scienceschemical sciencesinorganic chemistryhalogens
Keywords
Programme(s)
- HORIZON.1.1 - European Research Council (ERC) Main Programme
Funding Scheme
HORIZON-ERC-POC - HORIZON ERC Proof of Concept GrantsHost institution
08193 Cerdanyola Del Valles
Spain