Suchergebnisse

An improved non-aqueous decontaminant has been explored against chemical warfare agents sulfur mustard (HD) and soman (GB). This decontaminant comprises of 2-aminoethanol (30% w/v), dimethylamino ethanol (42% w/v), sodium hydroxide (2% w/v), benzotriazole (1% w/v), and dimethyl sulfoxide (25 %) and it chemically degraded more than 99 % of sulfur mustard and soman within a time of 45 min at -35°C. It was found to be effective over a broad range of temperatures from -35 to +55°C without losing its efficacy even at sub zero temperatures. This decontaminant exhibited decontamination ratio of V[Detoxicant]/V[HD, GD] 50 or 5 while a recently reported one exhibited a ratio of 100 or 2 against HD or GD respectively. Although, this ratio decreased slightly in the case of GD, it is sufficient enough for complete decontamination. This improved decontaminant meets all the military requirements and promise its field application in near future.

Technological advancements in the field of chemical threat have made it possible to create extremely dangerous chemical warfare agents (CWA). Hence, the effective protection of personnel is very important in a chemical warfare scenario amidst the current climate of terrorism awareness. In particular, body protection plays a substantial role in the chemical defence considering the urgency of situation in the nuclear, biological and chemical environment. Activated carbon spheres (ACS) based permeable chemical protective clothing (coverall) was developed for protection against CWA. The adsorbent material i.e, ACS used in this protective clothing provided higher adsorption capacity (1029 mg/g in terms of iodine) and low thermal burden (34 °C WBGT index) compared to earlier indigenously developed NBC suit. This article focuses on the extensive evaluation of chemical protective clothing against sulfur mustard (HD), a CWA. The results revealed that the developed protective clothing provided more than 24 h protection against HD. This chemical protective suit is light weight (< 2.75 kg for XL size). It also has higher air permeability (> 30 cm3/s/cm2) as well as less water vapour resistance (< 9.6 m2Pa/W). With continued innovations in materials and attention to key challenges it is expected that advanced, multifunction chemical protective suit will play a pivotal role in the CWA protection scenario.