Sterly — the UVC handheld sanitizer effective against pathogens, including Covid-19
It has been more than a year already since the world got to know the coronavirus and terrifying consequences it has brought. The invisible threat made the world change the ways of thinking about bacteria, viruses and other germs. And it has clearly shown us that even highly-developed modern medicine cannot prevent disease outbreaks, suffering from the consequences.
While microorganisms have always been a part of our lives, the studies show that over the past 30 years, the frequency and diversity of disease outbreaks, caused by the microorganisms, have been growing steadily. And it is said that number is expected to keep growing ever faster, making the constant fights against invisible threats a norm in modern life. And the question arises here is how can we protect our and beloved ones’ lives? Of course, we can rely on our immune system or vaccinate but it is always better to prevent the disease. And while there is no 100% guarantee protection, we can reduce the chance of getting a disease by simply following rules: wear masks, wash hands, keep the distance, avoid crowds.
However, as the virus can remain on the different surfaces for up to a couple of days, you might also want to have a device that cleans them before touching. And such a device is Sterly — a portable UVC flashlight-designed sterilizer that kills pathogens in seconds.
UVC technology has been around for over a decade and is widely used for hospital cleaning, water sterilization, and cabin disinfection in planes. However, the majority of products leveraging this technology are mercury UV lamps, which are not convenient enough for day-to-day personal use: they are too big to carry, mercury is toxic, and the lamps require long warm-up times. Most commercially available UVC products that are small and convenient are too weak to alter RNA/DNA inside microbes.
What is Sterly?
Sterly is specifically designed for sterilizing objects we encounter frequently a day: phones, masks, utensils, water bottles, electronics, money public surfaces like door handles, toilet flush buttons, rails, etc, making it multifunctional. It is portable and convenient, a size of 10x3x3cm mercury-free Sterly is simple to use, works straight away, and fits in your pocket or purse. It is equipped with a Klaran made 60mW 265nm LED (KL265–50U-SM-WD), cleaning an item in 5–15 seconds, depending on size and distance to the object.
Sterly cleans a mask in about 15 seconds each sides without destroying its structure (According to an NCBI journal article, a UVC dose of 10J/cm2 does not change a normal surgical mask’s filtration efficiency) which means that the reusability of masks can be greatly increased, dramatically reducing the amount of disposed masks.
As UVC light can be harmful to humans, Sterly has a tailor-made circuit to combine a bright, visible pilot LED and invisible UVC light, it is easy to tell when it is switched on and which areas are being disinfected. The 265nm wavelength UVC light can effectively sanitize anything, as electromagnetic radiation emitted by the UV light is the same as the one we receive from the sun which is mostly absorbed by the ozone layer and atmosphere. UVC light is widely used for disinfection and sterilization by damaging microbes’ DNA/RNA. As the genetic material is damaged, the pathogens cannot replicate or infect new hosts.
There are a lot of factors that can affect the effectiveness of UVC radiation, for example, the humidity and wavelengths. A 222nm radiation is more absorbed by water than a 265nm radiation meanwhile 265nm is about 20% more effective than 254nm radiation to the RNA of viruses [A], etc. There are numerous studies that can give us some ideas of the dose needed to inactivate germs:
1. [Sars-Cov-2 studies with 280nm radiation]
2. [Sar-Cov-2 studies with 222nm radiation]
3. [Sar-Cov-2 studies with 265nm radiation]
4. Different pathogens studies with UVC radiation [1] [2] [3] [4]
With the above studies show that Covid-19, the virus with ssRNA and one of the easiest to be inactivated, required 5.1mJ/cm2 of dose with 265nm radiation while other studies are supporting approximate from 2.5mJ/cm2 to 8mJ/cm2 dose depending on the wavelength. At the same time, many kinds of pathogens require similar doses to be inactivated while there are some like Calicivirus which require around 20mJ/cm2 to be inactivated. Sterly reaches 5.1mJ/cm2 of dose in 6sec at 5cm distance (3sec at 3cm distance).
In addition, Sterly’s components are of high quality, as its UVC LEDs are manufactured by Klaran — a Japanese company with 30 years of experience that cooperates with a number of well-respected companies, such as ___. The body manufacturer is LUMICA, a Japanese company with vast experience in manufacturing different popular items.
Sterly is the best handheld flashlight-inspired UVC device. Striving for an intelligent and sophisticated balance between power and convenience, Sterly is superior to other UVC handheld devices existing in the market in powerfulness, convenience and safety.
Pricing and Availability
Sterly will be available on Kickstarter in 3 weeks. Once the campaign ends, the products are set to ship to all backers by May 2021. The starting price for one Sterly is $69USD.
Want to learn more about Sterly? Please visit their official website at https://www.sterlyuvc.com/.
Contact Info:
Anna Tokarieva
Public Relations