Researchers at UC Santa Barbara, Oregon State University, the University of Manchester and ETH Zurich are calling for a closer look at the sun’s ability to neutralize SARS-CoV-2 after finding that the latest study on this topic was not at height.
The team compared data from a July 2020 study that reported rapid solar inactivation of SARS-CoV-2 in a laboratory setting with a theory of coronavirus inactivation by solar radiation, which was published just one month ago. before.
They observed that the virus was inactivated up to eight times faster in experiments than the most recent theoretical model predicted. “The theory is that inactivation works by UV-B hitting the virus’s RNA, affecting it,” UC Santa Barbara professor of mechanical engineering and lead author Paolo Luzzatto-Fegiz said in a statement.
However, the research team considered that UV-B inactivation of RNA “may not be the whole story”. Scientists have speculated that there could be another mechanism at play besides RNA inactivation by UV-B rays, such as UV-A, the less energetic component of sunlight.
“People think that UV-A doesn’t have much effect, but it could interact with some of the molecules in the environment,” Luzzatto-Fezig explained. In turn, those molecules could interact with the virus, accelerating inactivation.
“So scientists don’t know what’s going on yet,” Luzzatto-Fegiz said; “Our analysis indicates the need for additional experiments to test the effects of specific light wavelengths and average composition separately.”
If UV-A proves to be able to inactivate the coronavirus, this could prove very fruitful, as there are now many types of cheap LED bulbs that are even brighter than natural sunlight. UV-A could also potentially be used to amplify the effect of air filtration systems with a relatively low risk to human health.