Polymers with antiviral properties: A brief review.

ABSTRACT

Viruses that are pathogenic to humans and livestock pose a serious epidemiological threat and challenge the world's population. The SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19 pandemic has made the world aware of the scale of the threat. The surfaces of various materials can be a source of viruses that remain temporarily contagious in the environment. Few polymers have antiviral effects that reduce infectivity or the presence of a virus in the human environment. Some of the effects are due to certain physical properties, e.g., high hydrophobicity. Other materials owe their antiviral activity to a modified physicochemical structure favoring the action on specific virus receptors or on their biochemistry. Current research areas include gluten, polyvinylidene fluoride, polyimide, polylactic acid, graphene oxide, and polyurethane bound to copper oxide. The future belongs to multi-component mixtures or very thin multilayer systems. The rational direction of research work is the search for materials with a balanced specificity in relation to the most dangerous viruses and universality in relation to other viruses.