FAQ

Who will use AllClir measurable disinfectant sensors (MDS)?

Hospitals, nursing homes, prisons, military bases, naval ships, cruise ships, meat and produce processing, schools, car rentals, hotels, etc.

How does an AllClir sensor work?

An “AllClir” sensor utilizes particular sets of chemical reactions when in contact, respectively, with free chlorine- or hydrogen peroxide- or thymol- or acid- or quaternary ammonia-based disinfectants. The irreversible reaction flips the chemical indicator to a different color.

Can AllClir sensors be customized?

AllClir has a production capacity in the USA of 4.8 million units per day. Yet we are indeed a bespoke shop, meaning we can tailor solutions to fit your specific needs. Not sure your disinfectant will work with our sensor? We’ll test it out and make a special sensor for it if need be. Want tape instead of stickers? No problem. Want to deploy using a sticker gun? Sure thing. Want an especially inconspicuous sticker for covert auditing? Say no more. Want sensors in tag form to attach to plants, to help you fight mold? No problemo. Want to co-brand with your logo? Of course. Co-brand in terms of shape? We can do that too. QR code pointing to a co-branded webpage, perhaps emphasizing the importance of "wet time" (dwell time, contact time)? Easy.

What does OSHA say?

“If you oversee staff in a workplace, your plan should include considerations about the safety of custodial staff and other people who are carrying out the cleaning or disinfecting. These people are at increased risk of being exposed to the virus and to any toxic effects of the cleaning chemicals. These staff should wear appropriate PPE for cleaning and disinfecting. To protect your staff and to ensure that the products are used effectively, staff should be instructed on how to apply the disinfectants according to the label. For more information on concerns related to cleaning staff, visit the Occupational Safety and Health Administration’s (OSHA) website on Control and Prevention.”

How long does the AllClir sensor color change last?

The AllClir reaction is irreversible and tamper-resistant. Since they are single use sensors, we strongly recommend carefully filing them after use, for auditing purposes.

How is AllClir tamper resistant?

An AllClir sensor is not triggered by mere water nor by any other reagent that it is not engineered to work with.

How long does the sensor reaction take?

This reaction for all sensors is virtually instantaneous when the sensor is visibly wetted with disinfectant.

What is the lower limit disinfectant concentration an AllClir sensor can detect?

The sensors are designed to detect concentrations of disinfectant consistent with labelling and likewise with what is recommended by the US EPA and CDC.

Who created AllClir sensors?

AllClir was created by nanotechnologists and inorganic chemists.

What types of disinfectants do the US EPA and CDC recommend for disinfection of SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19)?

It’s an EPA thing, because we are basically talking about a pesticide. Click here for the EPA approved “List N” of disinfectants for killing SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19).

Does AllClir offer its own disinfectant brand?

No, we partner with existing disinfectant brands and sprayer brands and the companies that distribute and use them.

What is “contact time” and how is AllClir related to it?

Many of the benefits of AllClir measurable disinfectant sensors (MDS) relate to the grossly underappreciated concept of “dwell time” — alias “contact time”, “wet time”, “exposure time”. Dwell time is listed on each disinfectant’s label per government requirements. The US EPA, for instance, requires the disinfectant manufacturer to perform original microbiological testing using EPA-approved methods to tie the general microbial kill claim (e.g. 99.9999%) of the disinfectant manufacturer to a particular microbe and concentration of disinfectant and to a minimum “contact time”. The contact time is the minimum duration the disinfectant must remain “visibly wet” (i.e. to the healthy naked eye) on a hard surface to achieve the kill claim with respect to the particular microbe and disinfectant concentration.

These contact times range from 15 seconds to 10 minutes and sometimes even longer!

Why is so much time required to really do the job?

Well, the bad guys we are addressing with disinfectants — e.g. SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19), SARS-CoV-1, MERS-CoV, other coronaviruses, Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), c. difficile, to name just a few — don’t die right away like in the movies, they die hard.

Now, if the contact time is not observed, the user of the disinfectant cannot legally claim they have disinfected the surface in question. As required by the US Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA), product labels state, “it is a violation of Federal law to use this product in a manner inconsistent with its labeling.”

Think about that.

The concept of contact time is necessary but fraught with challenges. Keeping a surface visibly wet long enough can be especially difficult when using disinfectants that require a long contact time such as ten minutes. Under some conditions, e.g. high temperatures and low humidity, the challenge is just as difficult when the labeled contact time is as short as three or four minutes. Disinfectants with high alcohol content evaporate very quickly and thus are most problematic vis-à-vis contact time.

If the disinfectant does dry on the surface before the contact time is reached, label instructions typically insist on re-application to ensure the contact time requirement is met.

Truth is, the contact time requirement is rarely observed.

Which is to say, disinfection to the intended kill percentage is rarely confirmed and probably rarely occurs.

Clearly that needs to change — and fast.

Enter AllClir.

An AllClir measurable disinfectant sensor (MDS) immediately detects when the presence of a disinfectant — whether free chlorine-, hydrogen peroxide-, thymol-, acid- or quaternary ammonium-based — is sufficient for proper disinfection to ensue.

The AllClir sensor changes color immediately and irreversibly when initial wetness with the disinfectant has been achieved on the surface. Although for true disinfection the disinfectant should remain visibly wet on the surface for anywhere from 15 seconds to 10 minutes or more, depending on the product’s labeled contact time, AllClir confirms the necessary condition of initial wetness. Moreover, AllClir provides simple visual feedback that allows the operator to optimize the application process to avoid the costs of over-spraying — which include damage to the surfaces, environment and perhaps people. Without that very obvious feedback, the operator must rely on visible wetness only, a reliance compromised by dependence on distance, angle, lighting, eyesight and, yes, diligence.

The AllClir sensor provides proof the surface was wetted with disinfectant. The sensor remains in its triggered state permanently — signaling “AllClir” to cleaners, management, auditors and customers alike. You can then dispose of the sensor or file it as a permanent record of disinfection.

This validation, training and auditing tool does not replace the concept of contact time but honors and reinforces it in an edifying way, resulting in a much greater frequency of true disinfection — and thus a much lower frequency of infections and a markedly greater confidence among staff and customers.

Now, as you will surmise per the above discussion, the ol’ spray-and-wipe technique simply does not work to disinfect!

There are four main reasons disinfectants do not immediately achieve their labeled kill percentage (e.g. 99.99%) but rather require a significant duration to do so:

• Death is based on chemical reactions, and every chemical reaction takes time, especially when the molecules we are trying to disrupt, denature or inactivate — namely cell wall lipids, cell proteins, RNA, DNA, energy-producing enzymes — are very complicated molecules.
• Moreover, we are trying to effect huge numbers of such changes in order to achieve a certain kill percentage (e.g. 99.9% or more). Which is to say, we are very much talking in terms of thermodynamics — and that means big, macroscopic chunks of time must be involved. (* See details at bottom.)
• It also means liquid water must be present, as a solvent, to facilitate both the chemistry and the thermodynamics.
• Furthermore, we are constrained to use disinfectants that are not too strong, not too fast acting, as to be too dangerous to us or destructive to the material we are disinfecting.

* The effectiveness of a given disinfectant depends on the concentration of disinfectant, contact time, temperature, turbidity, particulate concentration, and specific microorganisms. Because the concentration of microorganisms varies widely, microorganism concentrations are typically expressed in what are called log units, which is simply a way to compact a very wide range of data so it fits nicely within a far more convenient and thus heuristic purview. If concentrations are expressed in #/ml, then the log concentration is equal to the base 10 logarithm of the actual concentration (Table 1).

Table 1. Log units as used to define microorganism concentrations.

The effect of disinfectant concentration and contact time on the mortality of typical microorganisms is presented in Figure 1. For many microorganisms, the rate of kill is a straight line on a semi-log plot. Therefore, it takes the same time to reduce the concentration of microorganisms from 1,000,000 to 100,000/ml as from 100 to 10/ml.

Note a reduction in 1 log unit is equal to a 90% reduction in concentration and a reduction in 2 log units is equal to a 99.0% reduction in concentration. Common goals in this respect are 99.99% and 99.9999% reductions, which are referred to as “4 log kill” and “6 log kill”, respectively. As the concentration of disinfectant is increased, the rate of kill is increased. Therefore, to achieve a specific final (low) concentration of microorganisms, a high disinfectant concentration at a short contact time or a low concentration at a long contact time may be used.

What’s the difference between products that disinfect, sanitize, or clean surfaces; and what is sterilization?

At the EPA, products used to kill viruses and bacteria on surfaces are registered as antimicrobial pesticides.

Yes, sanitizers and disinfectants are two types of antimicrobial pesticides. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulates hand sanitizers, antiseptic washes, and antibacterial soaps, i.e. pesticides for use on people. Here, however, we are not talking about products used on people.

Disinfectant products for use on inanimate surfaces are subject to more rigorous EPA testing requirements and must clear a higher bar for effectiveness than sanitizing products for use on inanimate surfaces.

There are no sanitizer-only products with EPA-approved virus claims. For this reason, sanitizers do not qualify for inclusion on the EPA List N: Disinfectants for Use Against SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19).

There are many products registered with the EPA as both sanitizers and disinfectants because they’ve been tested using both standards. These products are eligible for inclusion on the EPA’s List N because of their disinfectant claims. When using these products, follow the directions for virucidal disinfection, and pay close attention to the contact time, which is how long the surface must remain “visibly” wet. This duration can often be several minutes.

Cleaning products must be registered by the EPA if they make pesticidal or disinfection claims on their labeling, such as controlling a pest, bacteria or virus. Otherwise cleaning means just removing unwanted macroscopic material. Cleaning is nevertheless fundamentally important in relation to disinfection and sanitation because disinfection and sanitization claims are made in relation to an already clean(ed) surface. In practice, cleaning should be performed thoroughly before disinfection or sanitation.

As for sterilization, that’s a matter for laboratories and surgical instruments and such; it’s not a matter of public health. Sterilization means killing not just a certain percentage (e.g. 99.9999%) of a certain list of bacteria and viruses but killing almost certainly all conceivable lifeforms within a surface or space.

What about disinfecting with ozone?

Ozone has issues.

For one thing, ozone is very dangerous to your mucous membranes (e.g. throat, lungs) – so much so that California, for instance, has outlawed the sale of ozone generators to the general public. Ozone can also damage materials such as rubber, electrical wire coating, fabrics, and artwork.

By the same token, disinfection with ozone takes about an hour of fogging followed by about 2 hours of airing out. So, three hours minimum before staff or customer can enter the space.

What’s more, as yet there is no scientific proof ozone disinfects sufficiently against SARS-CoV2 (2019). Ozone is not on the EPA approved “List N” of disinfectants for killing SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19).

From https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7595067/:

Ozone was shown to be highly effective to inactivate the [original, 2002] SARS virus, in fact, it shows an inactivation rate not lesser than 99%. The novel SARS-CoV2 (2019), an enveloped virus like all other coronaviruses, shows 80% of genome sequence similarity to SARS-CoV (2002) and this suggests that ozone could be equally effective also on the novel coronavirus. …

In conclusion, although the existing scientific literature supports the effectiveness of ozone in the inactivation of viruses, there are very few studies about it on the SARS virus and not still a single study about its efficiency of inactivation on SARS-CoV-2. Therefore, in the absence of scientific literature, it is possible to assume that ozone is equally effective in inactivating SARS-CoV-2, however specific studies must be conducted to know also the ozone dose and effective exposure times.

Also see: https://www.epa.gov/coronavirus/why-arent-ozone-generators-uv-lights-or-air-purifiers-list-n-can-i-use-these-or-other

How about disinfecting with steam?

Steam works to disinfect and even sterilize items in a highly controlled environment, e.g. an autoclave in a hospital or laboratory.

But disinfection by steam means controlled temperature, pressure, and time – lots of time.

From Consumer Reports, August 2, 2020:

[H]ow high does the temperature need to be? According to Philip M. Tierno, Ph.D., a clinical professor of microbiology and pathology at New York University, most pathogens, including the coronavirus, will die at 212° F.

Steam mops can get up to that temperature, but you’d have to hold the mop in place for at least 10 minutes at a time for it to be effective. And that’s the catch: Steaming your floor for minutes at a time can kill pathogens—and also damage your floor. (Steam can pop tiles and force its way under wood floor boards and warp them.)

Furthermore, some steam mops require you to manually pump them to generate steam, which means the temperature may fluctuate, making it hard to tell whether you’re really killing any germs.

From Scientific American, March 27, 2020:

And some cleaning methods have only mixed support. The Environmental Protection Agency has put out a list of approved disinfectants for use against SARS-CoV-2, but the list currently only includes chemicals. Olinger said that, based on current evidence, while steam can kill the virus, it needs a lengthier application time than some users may realize. [Patty Olinger is executive director of the Global Biorisk Advisory Council (GBAC), a division of ISSA, a cleaning industry trade association.] “At this point during the pandemic I would not use steam at all,” Wilcox wrote, citing a lack of strong evidence. [Heidi Wilcox is a microbiologist and commercial cleaning consultant.]