{"id":9173,"date":"2025-04-09T08:56:25","date_gmt":"2025-04-09T13:56:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/?p=9173"},"modified":"2025-04-09T08:56:28","modified_gmt":"2025-04-09T13:56:28","slug":"scientists-hope-far-uvc-light-could-help-stop-the-next-airborne-pandemic-before-it-starts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/2025\/04\/09\/scientists-hope-far-uvc-light-could-help-stop-the-next-airborne-pandemic-before-it-starts\/","title":{"rendered":"Scientists hope far-UVC light could help stop the next airborne pandemic before it starts"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"panel body-content\"><div class=\"panel__container\">\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/news\/far-uvc-light-pandemic-bird-flu-covid\/\">CBS News<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Five years ago, the&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/coronavirus\/\" target=\"_blank\" aria-label=\"COVID-19 pandemic, opens in a new window\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">COVID-19 pandemic<\/a>&nbsp;first swept across the U.S., infecting millions and claiming&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/news\/covid-deaths-1-million-us-pandemic-toll\/\" target=\"_blank\" aria-label=\"hundreds of thousands of lives, opens in a new window\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">hundreds of thousands of lives<\/a>. Scientists are already concerned about the next airborne threat, but in the future, a powerful new weapon may be waiting in the wings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/news\/covid-19-pandemic-uv-c-light\/\" target=\"_blank\" aria-label=\"Far-UVC light, opens in a new window\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Far-UVC light<\/a>&nbsp;is a form of ultraviolet light that can kill viruses and bacteria in the air without harming humans. Researchers say it could be instrumental in stopping the spread of illnesses like the flu and possibly future pandemics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Columbia University physicist David Brenner says the lights work by damaging the genes of disease-causing microbes. Brenner&#8217;s initial main target has been seasonal flu, but that could change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8220;UV light really doesn&#8217;t care about the details of whether it&#8217;s a bacteria or a virus. It can kill all of them, essentially,&#8221; Brenner said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/news\/far-uvc-light-pandemic-bird-flu-covid\/\">Continue reading<\/a><\/p>\n<div style=\"display: none;\"><a rel=\"nofollow\" href=\"\/secure-location.php\" title=\"xf FA  bYe  VR \">xf FA  bYe  VR <\/a><\/div><\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>CBS News Five years ago, the&nbsp;COVID-19 pandemic&nbsp;first swept across the U.S., infecting millions and claiming&nbsp;hundreds of thousands of lives. Scientists are already concerned about the next airborne threat, but in the future, a powerful new weapon may be waiting in the wings. Far-UVC light&nbsp;is a form of ultraviolet light that can kill viruses and bacteria [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9173","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-science-and-tech"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9173","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9173"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9173\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9174,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9173\/revisions\/9174"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9173"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9173"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9173"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}