Bacterial Biofilm Formation on Nano-Copper Added PLA Suited for 3D Printed Face Masks
, Bernhard Peter Kaltschmidt 2,†, Ehsan Asghari 1, Andreas Hütten 2, Barbara Kaltschmidt 1,‡ and Christian Kaltschmidt 1,*,‡Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
The publication raises an important topic related to the prevention of infectious diseases. Especially today it is a topical issue as the world is trying to combat the COVID-19 epidemic. The problem of infectious diseases and the use of face masks are interrelated and development of new solutions is needed. However, it should be remembered that COVID-19 is a viral disease and quoting it in a publication related to bacterial infections is not entirely correct. It would have to be verified.
Moreover, there are some editing errors:
- strains names should be italicized, i.e. lines 19, 74, 89
- line 34: should be COVID-19 (revise in whole paper)
- line 74: should be: People tend to dispose their face masks improperly
- line 93: Sepsis is not a infection but rather a specific condition which arises in response to the infection. Moreover, not only hospital aquired pneumonia can be caused by these bacteria but several other nosocomial infections. Please, revise.
- line 109, 110: the degree Celsius symbol should be inserted
- line 112: should be 1.0 x 1.0 x 0.4 cm
- line 113: Was the sterility control conducted for the filaments? Do Authors prepared the experiments for non-bacteria samples? This should be explained and emphasized.
- line 132: should be H2O
- line 134: please unify in whole manuscript "min.", "mins" or "minutes"
- lines 172, 212, 213: the lack of space before ul
- lines 303, 306, 307, 309: should be 3.9 x 107 etc.
- line 376: Authors should discussed this issue
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
Impressive investigation linked with great effort. Results are interesting and manuscript is high quality
However I have some remarks
- masks must also comply with the legal requirements - therefore, 3D-printing performed by anybody is to be questioned. There is no
- how is the functionality tested or verified with regard to personnel protection?
- antimicrobial compounds are of interest but the possible health hazards of such materials should be discussed. Furthtermore, data revealed a low potential against relevant microorganisms-even copper. They might only present an ad on?
- for me it is not clear what is ment by ...Out of one single-use face mask six filters can be produced? (page 2)
- for me it is not clear what the authors mean with face mask-it should be clarified (eg. authors show a typical op mask in the pictogram but the final product does not display such a mask
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
