Prions, the infectious proteins that are the likely agents of Kuru, variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease ("Mad Cow Disease"), scrapie in sheep and Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD) of elk and deer, are the zombie undead of pathogens. Almost nothing we do inactivates them. They withstand fire, autoclaving, radiation and all manner of chemical disinfectants. Except for the mineral birnessite:
That the birnessite family of minerals possessed the capacity to degrade prions was a surprise, [Joel Pedersen, a University of Wisconsin-Madison environmental chemist] says. Manganese oxides like birnessite are commonly used in such things as batteries and are among the most potent oxidants occurring naturally in soils, capable of chemically transforming a substance by adding oxygen atoms and stripping away electrons. The mineral is most abundant in soils that are seasonally waterlogged or poorly drained."A variety of manganese oxide minerals exist and one of the most common is birnessite. They are common in the sense that you find them in many soils, but in low concentrations," says Pedersen. "They are among the strongest oxidants in soil." (ScienceDaily)
This surprising discovery, published early January in the Journal of General Virology, is potentially of practical importance. Prions infect pastures and barnyards and have been shown to stay active in soil for three years or more. This isn't yet a practical way to get rid of them, because the University of Wisconsin's Pedersen and his colleagues and their collaborators at the University of Naples were using prions in solution on a lab bench. They were trying to show that the mineral could oxidize prions. But what works effectively in solution on laboratory conditions might not work at all in the complex soil matrix where some prions hang out.
But if it works, its a zombie undead head shot.
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I remember reading something that copper ions plus hydrogen peroxide do also. My suspicion is that is is hydroxyl radical from the H2O2 in a Fenton-type reaction. Copper, manganese and iron would all work along with H2O2.
I suspect that this occurs during autophagy and is part of the normal recycling of damaged proteins. Low NO interferes with that by reducing the ATP level and slowing the rate of acidification of the lysosome.
A number of the protein aggregates that accumulate during neurodegeneration also accumulate metals on them. If autophagy were not turned off by low NO, those metals would generate hydroxyl during autophagy which would cleave what ever the metals were attached to. Amyloid, prions, tau, lipofuscin, nothing can survive hydroxyl radicals.
I think the problem with prions is exacerbated by low NO, which causes low ATP, which reduces the activity of the heat shock proteins that protect the proper protein folding configurations.
I remember reading that scrapie was quite persistent, even for decades. These agents would be helpful in disinfecting such fields, as well as water runoff. Unfortunately, I can't access Detwiler's 2003 paper on the epidemiology of scrapie right now, but it seems worth reviewing to check the details.
I believe that Fatal Familial Insomnia is also generally thought to be a prion disease
A bit old school as a oxidizing disinfectant, with a few problems, but it is still commonly used in water treatment to remove iron, has anyone tried potassium permanganate?
A couple years ago I read about cattle bred to lack the BSE gene. I wonder if someone could do the same for sheep and scrapie.
Geobacter consumes manganese oxides resulting in increased soluble manganese as is found in alzheimers. Reduced insoluble manganese oxide encourages prion protein formation found in alzheimers. Disrupted electron transfer is enhanced with the protein (ab) and tangles (nanowires)
As a worker in a diagnostic prion lab, this is reassuring. It would be mice to have something in a simple solution purely for bench top cleaning and sterilization of samples.
Besides I'd love to put 'Zombie Undead Prion Headshot' on a spray bottle and carry it around on my belt under a lab coat.