Design and Testing of Safer, More Effective Preservatives for Consumer Products

Preservatives
deter microbial growth, providing crucial functions
of safety and durability in composite materials, formulated products,
and food packaging. Concern for human health and the environmental
impact of some preservatives has led to regulatory restrictions and
public pressure to remove individual classes of compounds, such as
parabens and chromated copper arsenate, from consumer products. Bans
do not address the need for safe, effective alternative preservatives,
which are critical for both product performance (including lifespan
and therefore life cycle metrics) and consumer safety. In this work,
we studied both the safety and efficacy of a series of phenolic preservatives
and compared them to common preservatives found in personal care products
and building materials. We quantified antimicrobial activity against Aspergillus brasiliensis (mold) and Pseudomonas aeruginosa (Gram negative bacteria),
and we conducted a hazard assessment, complemented by computational
modeling, to evaluate the human and environmental health impacts of
these chemicals. We found that octyl gallate demonstrates better antimicrobial
activity and comparable or lower hazards, compared to current-use
preservatives. Therefore, octyl gallate may serve as a viable small-molecule
preservative, particularly in conjunction with low concentrations
of other preservatives that act through complementary mechanisms.

防腐剂可抑制微生物增殖，在复合材料、配方产品及食品包装中发挥保障安全与提升耐用性的关键作用。部分防腐剂对人体健康与环境造成的影响引发了广泛关注，促使监管机构出台限制措施，公众也呼吁从消费品中移除对羟基苯甲酸酯类（parabens）、铬酸铜砷酸盐（chromated copper arsenate）等各类化合物。禁用此类防腐剂并未解决对安全有效替代防腐剂的需求，而这类替代方案对产品性能（包括使用寿命及生命周期指标）与消费者安全均至关重要。本研究针对一系列酚类防腐剂的安全性与有效性展开探究，并将其与个人护理产品及建材中常用的防腐剂进行对比。我们定量测定了这些防腐剂对巴西曲霉（Aspergillus brasiliensis，霉菌）与铜绿假单胞菌（Pseudomonas aeruginosa，革兰氏阴性菌）的抗菌活性，并辅以计算建模开展危害性评估，以评价这些化学品对人体健康与环境的影响。研究发现，与当前使用的防腐剂相比，没食子酸辛酯（octyl gallate）具备更优异的抗菌活性，且危害性相当甚至更低。因此，没食子酸辛酯可作为一种可行的小分子防腐剂，尤其可与低浓度、作用机制互补的其他防腐剂复配使用。