Why are we far more likely to catch infections inside than outdoors and what gives ‘fresh air’ that clean and refreshing feel that we all love?
It’s all down to hydroxyls – powerful natural atmospheric cleaning agents.
Discovered by chance in the 1960's by the UK’s Ministry of Defence, hydroxyls are continually produced in abundance in outdoor air.
Hydroxyls are very reactive and within seconds seek out and break down contaminants in the air and on surfaces, waging a constant war of attrition against viruses, bacteria, allergens and pollution.
Hydroxyls are nature’s way of decontaminating our environment and keeping it safe for living things. They do it so well that scientists often refer to them as 'Nature's Detergent'.
But hydroxyls are only created naturally outside. Indoors, however hard and often you clean, bacteria and viruses constantly build up in the air and on surfaces, allergens remain active and smells stay smelly.
Airora's scientific breakthrough
NASA imagined, Airora delivered
NASA developed hydroxyl generation technology (photocatalytic oxidation, PCO) to keep the air clean and fruit and vegetables fresh on deep space missions.
But here on earth NASA's basic technology (including its derivative known as PECO) are not very effective. In common with traditional air purifiers they act as a filter which only reliably treats the limited amount of air passing through the device and would never be able to clean more than a small proportion of the ever changing air in a typical room.
Then along came Airora's scientists ...
Building on NASA's idea, our patented breakthrough Hydroxyl Cascade technology recreates what happens naturally in outdoors air, creating a self sustaining Hydroxyl Cascade which disperses throughout an entire room in seconds, by what scientists call 'molecular diffusion'.