C4: CRITICAL CLEANING FOR CONTAMINATION CONTROL - Cleaning with CO_(2): A Heartening Experience

摘要

This column is about real critical cleaning cleaning (flushing) of human wound cavities of air with gaseous CO_(2). These cavities are naturally full of air during cardiopulmonary bypass operations with an empty heart, and other open wounds. Cleaning operations including cleaning of rust from metal, particles from semiconductors, and operations of intermediate value have long been done with CO_(2). The phase of the CO_(2) has been solid, liquid, gas, or fluid. CO_(2) as a solid cleaning agent has taken the form of a cryogenically-produced pellet sized similar to a BB or a snowflake produced by expansion of pressurized liquid. Though not commercially successful, use of liquid CO_(2) has been patented for dry cleaning as a replacement for perchloroethylene. And the U.S. Department of Energy has patented use of supercritical CO_(2) (SCCOR), with selected co-solvents for use in removing intractable materials such as photoresists by causing them to swell with dissolved CO_(2).