Ultrasound & Water Blast Contamination from Surfaces

Soaps, disinfectants, powerful chemicals and high-pressure sprays are the standard when it comes to removing tough gunk like mascara, grease, blood and bacterial biofilms. There now appears to be a better way to scrub contaminants off surfaces–a gentle stream of water pulsing with ultrasonic soundwaves.

For several years, researchers at the University of Southampton in the UK have been working on a device they call the StarStream, which has a special nozzle that injects bubbles and ultrasound into a water stream.

In a number of videos, ultrasonics and underwater acoustics professor Timothy Leighton demonstrates the water-gun-shaped device’s ability to scrub away mascara between a metal file’s teeth, tissue from bone, grease from a spring and bacteria from teeth. In their most recent study, they say StarStream is good enough to disinfect medical instruments after contamination with tissue, body fluids and bacteria. Learn more below.

“In the absence of sufficient cleaning of medical instruments, contamination and infection can result in serious consequences for the health sector and remains a significant challenge,” Leighton and colleagues wrote recently in the journal Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics.

The instrument uses purified room-temperature water and needs neither chemical additives or pumps to create a high-pressure stream to mechanically remove debris. Instead, it harnesses a phenomenon called cavitation to create scrubbing power. Ultrasound pumped into the water stream causes rapid pressure changes that act on the bubbles also in the water stream. This change makes the bubbles burst and releases powerful shockwaves that can mechanically dislodge contaminants stuck on a range of surfaces from metal and glass to skin, bone and tooth enamel.

“This study illustrates the potential in harnessing an ultrasonically activated stream to remove biological contamination including brain tissue from surgical stainless steel substrates, S. epidermidis biofilms from glass, and fat/soft tissue matter from bone structures with considerable basic and clinical applications,” they write.



The group has now developed a prototype for a commercial model and hope to sell it to the healthcare industry. “Commercialization is vital: if we cannot build a business that can sell thousands of these to health providers at a price they find attractive, this invention will stay in the laboratory and help no-one,” Leighton said.

All gifs except bottom created from Youtube video courtesy of Timothy Leighton. Bottom gif created from supplemental video courtesy of Birkin et al./Phys. Chem. Chem. Phys.