Filtration article for personal protective equipment

Abstract

A filtration article for using in personal protective equipment (“PPE”) that includes one or more layers. The article has an external side for facing side the environment and an internal side for facing the body of a user. The article is air permeable but has a porosity sufficient to entrap and thereby filter selected infectious agents (IAs). The one or more layers comprise structures providing two or more of the following functional features selected from the group of: (1) a structure with oligodynamic materials for inactivating the selected IAs; (2) a structure of carbon fibers or particles for moisture management and/or conductive cooling; (3) a knit or woven structure having yarns in a denier gradient that causes wicking of water from the internal side of the mask toward the external side; (4) an energized or energizable structure that subjects entrapped IAs to current, charged particles, electrostatic discharge, resistive heating, IR heating and/or disruptive electromagnetic energy; and (5) a hydrophobic structure forming an external surface of the external side for repelling droplets and other moisture from absorbing into the surface.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.