Wiping Out Body Odor by Starving Bacteria

A soap or deodorant that kills the odor from underarms and blocks the infection of bacteria is under development using the physiology of germs.

The easiest way preventing the infection of bacteria is washing with soap. Soap mops up the bacteria stick to the skin, and the antibiotics added to the soap restraints the growth of the bacteria left. The newly developed super soap blocks the bacteria from clinging to the skin from the first.

The Super soap that researchers from Colgate-Palmolive Co. in Piscataway, New Jersey are developing forms a kind of protective film on the skin using the materials like Vaseline.

The researchers rubbed a plastic board with bacteria on the both hands after washing one hand with an ordinary soap and the other with super soap. They found 50 to 58 percent less bacteria on the hand washed with super soap than on the other hand after three times experiments.

The odor of underarms comes from the bacteria of iron. Present deodorant, which relies on ethanol to kill bacteria, does not last long due to its volatility.

Dr. Andrew Landa and colleagues from the Unilever Research & Development Laboratory in Port Sunlight, UK, have developed a way to starve these bacteria of iron, thus slowing bacterial growth and reducing odor.

Dr. Landa developed 2 chemicals. The one is a molecule that mops up iron by combining with iron before bacteria can bind to it. Then, bacteria are searching for the iron from the protein in the sweat. The other chemical that the laboratory developed is a molecule that loosens the bond between iron and the protein. The iron divided from the protein binds to the first chemical starving bacteria of iron.

The researchers said that the bacteria was cut by 90 percent and the odor of armpits dropped to the minimum after two weeks’ using of the new product in 50 volunteers. And the deodorant added with these chemicals killed far more bacteria compared with the ethanol treatment after 24 hours’ application.

These research results were read at 102nd annual meeting of American Society for Microbiology held in Salt Lake City, U.S.

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