3 ms·

We use a steam-cleaning device (looks like a small vacuum cleaner) at home and I swear we get sick less often if we use it regularly. It supposedly kills over 9

by manmal 8y ago

We use a steam-cleaning device (looks like a small vacuum cleaner) at home and I swear we get sick less often if we use it regularly. It supposedly kills over 99% of all kinds of pathogens. Not sure if it creates resistant strains, but I guess such high temperatures are difficult to adapt to.

diminish 8y ago
do u stay home most of the tıme? like one family member in public (transportation) usually is enough to bring the recent fashion of viruses.
- manmal 8y ago
  I don't, but my wife currently, and ~1 kid on average. It's a germ breeding ground :)
smhost 8y ago
thinking about this makes me wonder whether we have any symbiosis with bacteria outside of our bodies
Double_a_92 8y ago
Killing 99% of everything is not very good if you have young children. It can lead to allergies, if their immune system can't train on harmless bacteria.
- neuronic 8y ago
  That's nothing but a hypothesis. It might very well be the case but it isn't proven at all. So stop spreading it as if it were fact. So sick of bullshitism on the Internet.
  - pbhjpbhj 8y ago
    Surely bullshit is something that's clearly false?
    - neuronic 8y ago
      Implying that the hygiene hypothesis is a fact is clearly false.
  - slfnflctd 8y ago
    Well, there is this research published last year (it's about asthma, though, not allergies as far as I can tell): https://www.nih.gov/news-events/nih-research-matters/infant-exposure-pet-pest-allergens-may-reduce-asthma-risk https://www.nih.gov/news-events/nih-research-matters/infant-...
- manmal 8y ago
  I actually started the routine because we had a lot of black mold in the air (everytime food spoiled somewhere hidden [which happens a lot with kids], it went all black immediately), which seems to be gone now—spoiled food does not go black anymore. Since black mold (aflatoxin) can cause liver cancer and other bad diseases, I'd rather keep that down and risk allergies.
jerf 8y ago
"Not sure if it creates resistant strains" No, it shouldn't. Despite what some people say about "life finding a way" (a quote from a movie, mind you, not like, actual science), there's plenty of stuff that life can't adapt to. Being exposed to its fundamental substrate at above-local-boiling temperatures is one of them. It's a physical attack. There's also some techniques that kill bacteria by poking them with nano-scale spikes. You might get something slightly more resistant than before, but there's no scenario in which some bacterium evolves something other than a fatty-protein cell wall and suddenly you get these cells encased in pure titanium or something. (I am aware of extremophiles. You'll note they still live where water is liquid in the local pressure/temperature regime, and I guarantee you that if you try to "infect" a human with an extremophile that the outcome will be a race between the human immune system killing it, and the extremophile simply keeling over dead due to not being able to survive in this environment. If it isn't already dead due to essentially freezing to death.) Plus, even if it did become resistant to steam, that quite likely still play in your favor. In order to become resistant to steam, it would have to give up other things that it currently spends its "budget" on. Odds are pretty decent that in the process they'd evolve into something less adapted to bothering you. Again, contrary to some people's beliefs that bacteria are infinitely adaptable, they actually live on a very tight budget due to how competitive their spaces are; if they add an adaptation to something, they're going to give up adaptations to something else in the process. Nothing is free to them.
- gerbilly 8y ago
  > In order to become resistant to steam, it would have to give up other things that it currently spends its "budget" on. Exactly this. When bacteria become resistant to an antibiotic, they typically do so by giving up a metabolic pathway. If you take away the antibiotic, they usually quickly revert to the 'wild type' of bacteria. As for becoming resistant to steam, even if they could do it, once you stopped applying steam, then they'd probably be unable to survive at room temperature.

by manmal 8y ago

diminish 8y ago

do u stay home most of the tıme? like one family member in public (transportation) usually is enough to bring the recent fashion of viruses.

manmal 8y ago
I don't, but my wife currently, and ~1 kid on average. It's a germ breeding ground :)

smhost 8y ago

thinking about this makes me wonder whether we have any symbiosis with bacteria outside of our bodies

Double_a_92 8y ago

Killing 99% of everything is not very good if you have young children. It can lead to allergies, if their immune system can't train on harmless bacteria.

neuronic 8y ago
That's nothing but a hypothesis. It might very well be the case but it isn't proven at all. So stop spreading it as if it were fact. So sick of bullshitism on the Internet.
- pbhjpbhj 8y ago
  Surely bullshit is something that's clearly false?
  - neuronic 8y ago
    Implying that the hygiene hypothesis is a fact is clearly false.
- slfnflctd 8y ago
  Well, there is this research published last year (it's about asthma, though, not allergies as far as I can tell): https://www.nih.gov/news-events/nih-research-matters/infant-exposure-pet-pest-allergens-may-reduce-asthma-risk https://www.nih.gov/news-events/nih-research-matters/infant-...
manmal 8y ago
I actually started the routine because we had a lot of black mold in the air (everytime food spoiled somewhere hidden [which happens a lot with kids], it went all black immediately), which seems to be gone now—spoiled food does not go black anymore. Since black mold (aflatoxin) can cause liver cancer and other bad diseases, I'd rather keep that down and risk allergies.

jerf 8y ago

"Not sure if it creates resistant strains" No, it shouldn't. Despite what some people say about "life finding a way" (a quote from a movie, mind you, not like, actual science), there's plenty of stuff that life can't adapt to. Being exposed to its fundamental substrate at above-local-boiling temperatures is one of them. It's a physical attack. There's also some techniques that kill bacteria by poking them with nano-scale spikes. You might get something slightly more resistant than before, but there's no scenario in which some bacterium evolves something other than a fatty-protein cell wall and suddenly you get these cells encased in pure titanium or something. (I am aware of extremophiles. You'll note they still live where water is liquid in the local pressure/temperature regime, and I guarantee you that if you try to "infect" a human with an extremophile that the outcome will be a race between the human immune system killing it, and the extremophile simply keeling over dead due to not being able to survive in this environment. If it isn't already dead due to essentially freezing to death.) Plus, even if it did become resistant to steam, that quite likely still play in your favor. In order to become resistant to steam, it would have to give up other things that it currently spends its "budget" on. Odds are pretty decent that in the process they'd evolve into something less adapted to bothering you. Again, contrary to some people's beliefs that bacteria are infinitely adaptable, they actually live on a very tight budget due to how competitive their spaces are; if they add an adaptation to something, they're going to give up adaptations to something else in the process. Nothing is free to them.

gerbilly 8y ago
> In order to become resistant to steam, it would have to give up other things that it currently spends its "budget" on. Exactly this. When bacteria become resistant to an antibiotic, they typically do so by giving up a metabolic pathway. If you take away the antibiotic, they usually quickly revert to the 'wild type' of bacteria. As for becoming resistant to steam, even if they could do it, once you stopped applying steam, then they'd probably be unable to survive at room temperature.