General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Making Masks Active with Soap to Protect Against Coronavirus [View all]ProfessorGAC
(64,425 posts)As some here know my professional expertise was reaction kinetics & surface chemistry.
Surfactants do indeed, disrupt viral reproduction, either lipid stripping, protein solvolysis, or both. Or, micellization takes place capturing them in suspension, so they get fully rinsed away.
The problem is, with all of these mechanisms a critical component is water.
A dried surfactant has insufficient ionic strength to strip the lipid layer, until it's dissociated in water.
Dry, most of them are neutral salts (anionic) or waxes (nonionic). They have no surface activity in dry form.
So, I'm dubious about this working, unless there is some way to keep the surfactant in, at least, a high viscosity colloidal suspension.
I understand the effort & the attempt to connect the safety elements of detergents & masks.
But, the surface & phase chemistry suggest this is likely to not work.