 Traffic! Hey everybody, Dr. O. I want to cover some basic microbial control terminology in this video. So we'll talk about the different ways to kill microbes later. I just want to get the terminology all in one place so we're all speaking the same language. So first, a couple things that aren't really on here. I want to compare the word sepsis to aseptic or asepsis. So sepsis or septic comes from the Greek word for decay or putrid, so think growth and tons of it. So if something is aseptic, that means without that overgrowth of organisms. So here's how I like to define aseptic like when we're talking about aseptic techniques. It's the absence of significant contamination. It is not a sterile environment, we'll talk about sterilization in just a moment. So that is septic versus aseptic. All right, so let's go ahead and look at this list here. So first you see for use on fomites, so fomites are inanimate objects that can spread disease. First we have disinfection. So disinfection is going to be whenever you're using a chemical or physical control method to kill organisms, to either to reduce the number of organisms that are on an inanimate object. So that's going to be the key there. So think about surfaces. So you use disinfectants like when we're cleaning our lab benches or when you're cleaning your toilet at home, right? So that's going to be disinfectant. Compare that to at the bottom of the screen there, an antiseptic. So antiseptics are going to do the same thing but on living tissue, on skin or living tissue. So a disinfectant, think inanimate object, think surface. Anaseptics, think living tissue. So they might be the same thing. There are some chemicals that are both. They can be used as disinfectants and antiseptics. Some hydrogen peroxide comes to mind. In general though, I do want you to know that disinfectants are harsher and usually stronger than antiseptics, which makes sense, right? Like if you're cleaning a lab bench or cleaning your toilet, you don't have to worry about killing it. When you're using a tissue on human skin, for example, you have to worry about damaging the surface, which happens to be a human being, right? So that's disinfectants versus antiseptics. All right, next we have sanitization. So the term sanitization is generally just used in a couple of contexts here. It's used when you're dealing with eating utensils. So like my parents used to own a little bar and restaurant when I was a kid and you had to wash, you know, had to rinse and wash dishes. But then you had to sanitize them with a chemical sanitizer. So when you hear the word sanitization, you generally are talking about eating utensils and that kind of thing. The other time you might see the word sanitization is in the dairy industry. So they will still use it, but that's not a super important term. Next, we have sterilization. So aseptic technique, disinfectants, antiseptics, they're all trying to reduce the number of microbes that are around. But if you can actually completely eliminate microbes, that's going to be sterilization. So as we go through the lists of physical and chemical control agents, there aren't many that are sterilizing agents that can kill all things, right? In our micro lab, the autoclave and the Bunsen burner are really the only two things that we use that are classified as sterilizing agents. So one more thing, so just remember sterilization is if you need to kill everything, you need a sterilizing agent, which means you got to kill vegetative living cells, you got to kill the spores, you got to kill everything, even things like infectious proteins, prions, et cetera. One more thing about the word sterilization, this can be a little confusing. You have commercial sterilization is not actually sterilization. We'll cover that later. But commercial sterilization uses what's called a 12D or 12 decimal treatment. And it's designed to kill all the clostridium botulinum that's around in your food, like canned foods, things like that. So it doesn't kill everything. If you're eating a can of cream corn, there shouldn't be any clostridium botulinum in there. 12D means that if we started with a trillion microbes, clostridium botulinum bacteria, there should only be one left. So hopefully you'd never have anything that contaminated. But there are still microorganisms in your canned goods. These would be like thermophilic organisms that like higher temperatures. They would survive that process. So just remember that commercial sterilization is not actually sterilization. Okay? All right. And then the last one on the list here, so we covered disinfection, sanitization, sterilization, antiseptics earlier, and then de-germing. So de-germing is the physical or mechanical removal of microbes. So think about like washing your hands. Washing your hand like soap isn't a powerful antiseptic. Soap is a de-germing agent. It helps physically remove microbes. Same thing if like you're using an alcohol wipe prior to giving somebody injection. Yes, the alcohol is going to function as an antiseptic, but you're also physically or mechanically removing microbes. So that's the term de-germing means. All right, that's the basic terminology. We'll come back in other videos and cover the physical and chemical control methods themselves. All right, have a wonderful day. Be blessed.