Abstract
Expensive and complex methodologies are available to determine the ethanol concentration in alcohol gel samples. The aim of this article was to demonstrate that alcoholmeter could be used as an alternative method to determine ethanol in gel formulations. Alcohol gel samples were produced using: hydroxypropylmethylcellulose (HPMC), hydroxyethylcellulose (HEC) and Carbopol 940© (CBP). A factorial design was performed to evaluate the interaction between the ethanol concentration, glycerin and polymer contents in the samples in the recovery data of the ethanol content. Rheological analyses were also performed to identify the limiting factors to ethanol quantification. All the results were compared to high resolution magic angle spinning nuclear magnetic resonance (HR-MAS NMR) as a reference methodology. The results demonstrated that the alcoholmeter could be used to determine alcohol concentration, moreover the level of polymer HEC or HPMC, glycerin and ethanol has no effect in the determination. Yield stress, and not viscosity or flow index, appeared as the limiting factor to the use of alcoholmeter in non-acidified CBP samples. Acidification appears to be mandatory to determination of ethanol concentration in CBP samples. It was possible to achieve an inexpensive, handy and fast methodology to quantify alcohol in gelled samples, in the range of concentrations used in this article.
Highlights
Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) brought the world into a public health emergency
Factorial design to evaluate the influence of ethanol, glycerin and polymer in alcohol quantification in gelled samples
Representative 1H high resolution magic angle spinning (HR-MAS) nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectra of the different polymers and concentrations were presented in the Supplementary Information section, Figures S1, S2 and S3, respectively for HPMC, HEC and Carbopol 940© (CBP) samples
Summary
Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) brought the world into a public health emergency. Beyond social distancing and use of protective masks, the disinfection of surfaces, objects and hands became the main way to stop and control virus spreading away.[1,2]. In this context, the ethanol-based hand sanitizers are indispensable to disinfection. Ethanol presents a very low cutaneous toxicity to humans and is an effective antiseptic and disinfectant at 60 to 80 wt.% solutions in water. It is well known that ethanol diluted in water causes accelerated microbiota’s protein denaturation, leading to the potent virucidal property of hydroalcoholic mixtures against the enveloped viruses as human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), influenza, herpes simplex virus 1 and SARS-CoV-2.3,4
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