By turning period blood into a gel, the pad’s alginate powder filler reduces leakage.
may solve that problem. The material, which solidifies menstrual blood by turning it into a gel mixture, could reduce leakage in period products without compromising capacity, researchers report July 10 in“Our paper is a proof of concept,” says Rogério Aparecido Bataglioli, a chemical engineer at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg. Before being used commercially, he says, the materials would need to be assessed for safety and scalability.
To solve this problem, the team turned to alginate, a naturally occurring substance derived from algae and seaweed. After the researchers screened a large pool of potential polysaccharides — long chains of carbohydrate molecules — that could have blood-absorbing properties, alginate excelled at absorbing and gelling blood. It also has already been approved by the Food and Drug Administration for use in pharmaceuticals, food and medical materials.
The team began with a control, dripping pig blood through gauze pads with no added material. The blood seeped throughout the gauze . When centrifuged over the well plate , lots of blood leaked out.They then moved on to commercial pad fillers, typically cellulose-based, and similarly collected the post-centrifuge leakage in a well plate. The commercial fillers leaked less than just gauze, but still leaked quite a bit.Researchers also tested polyacrylate, a superabsorbent polymer.
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