ABACO: A Thin Film Revolution, the Decisive Antibacterial Coating

摘要

In recent years, the role of bacterial contamination causing serious problems to human life has emerged. Many sectors are affected by this phenomenon [1]. The Center for Disease Control and the Food and Drug Administration estimated that every year, in the United States, 3 million people fall ill because of infections related to the consumption of contaminated food. The possible solution to reduce the risk of bacterial infections has been identified in the prevention through the provision of anti-bacterial features metal surfaces to those that are in daily contact with humans. Bacterial prevention has been pursued through the combination of PVD technology, already widely used for decorative metal coatings in the field, with the evaporation of special metal targets during an innovative thin film coating process. That solution lead to the realization of a new family of multilayer thin films doped with nanoparticles with strong antibacterial properties we called ABACO™ (AntiBActerial COating). The effective antibacterial activity of ABACO has been tested and certified by national and international laboratories by the use of normed testing protocols. Laboratory tests proved that ABACO combines the antibacterial properties with the required standard features of high quality PVD coatings.