Project Details
[Return to Previous Page]Design of the Electrical Circuit for the Plasma Patch Surface Barrier Discharge for treatment of inflammatory skin conditions
Company: PSU CLIPSE
Major(s):
Primary: EE
Secondary: BME
Optional: ME
Non-Disclosure Agreement: NO
Intellectual Property: NO
The Cross-disciplinary Laboratory for Integrated Plasma Science and Engineering (CLIPSE) has recently developed a novel cold plasma device for treatment of inflammatory skin conditions such as acne, atopic dermatitis, shingles, etc. through the Center for Biodevices Seed Grant program. The device, called the Plasma Patch, consists of a sheet of polyimide film (Kapton), on one side of which is a patterned silver electrode deposited with screen printing. The other side has a silver layer sputtered onto it, shown in Figure 1. The sputtered side is attached to the high-voltage side of an laboratory-grade electrical amplifier and the patterned side is attached to the electrical ground. Applying an approximately 1 kV sinusoidal waveform (at kHz frequencies) creates an alternating electric field through the Kapton and at the surface of the patterned electrode, where the ambient air is ionized, creating a plasma discharge, shown in Figure 2. This arrangement is called a surface barrier discharge (SBD), which produces reactive oxygen and nitrogen species (RONS), powerful biomolecules capable of pathogen inactivation, immune response regulation, cell proliferation, among other actions. The Plasma Patch has been tested and shown effective at eradicating both E. Coli and S. aureus within a minute, shown in Figure 3, with no negative effect on keratinocytes at the same dose. Further, it has been shown that the Plasma Patch is truly “cold” by measuring the temperature of the patterned surface after treatment, demonstrating only several degrees increase above ambient temperature. Collectively, results indicate the Plasma Patch has strong potential for the treatment of inflammatory skin conditions, but advancements in the electrical circuit and packaging are needed to move it out of the laboratory. The Senior Capstone team’s project goal would be to create an electrical circuit upstream of the actual SBD to replace the laboratory-grade voltage amplifier, resulting in a self-contained Plasma Patch that a person could sit comfortably or even walk around with during treatment of the skin condition. Deliverables include: 1) replacing wall power with some stored energy mechanism, ideally rechargeable, such as batteries; 2) stored energy must be converted and amplified into a similar sinusoidal kV waveform as delivered by the laboratory amplifier; 3) conduct lifetime testing (i.e. duration of continuous treatment until recharge is required; 4) design a safety circuit to both set a current limit from the battery, and to turn off the device if it is damaged; 5) design and prototype a packaging method to minimize the footprint and mass of the device, increasing the likelihood of adoption by consumers/clinicians. Customer discovery, interviews, and prototype evaluation by customers is expected in this Capstone project. An ideal Capstone team would consist of electrical engineering students as the primary discipline followed by biomedical engineering and mechanical engineering students as secondary and tertiary disciplines. PI Sean Knecht and CLIPSE senior graduate student, Ali Kazemi, will act as the team mentors and would expect to meet weekly with the student team. As their design develops, it will directly integrate it with the Plasma Patch prototypes for biological and safety testing, providing them additional feedback on their design.
