Federal Project Grant Award Summary

Advanced Cooling Technologies Inc. (ACT) received a $999,890 Project Grant from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) under the Food and Drug Administration Research program (CFDA 93.103), awarded September 30, 2025, with completion targeted for August 31, 2027. The project develops a novel dry air plasma sterilization system designed to address significant limitations in current endoscope sterilization technologies. The system addresses regulatory pressures on ethylene oxide (ETO)—a mainstream sterilant facing tightened restrictions due to toxicity and carcinogenicity—and overcomes constraints of alternative vaporized hydrogen peroxide (VHP) technologies, which cannot reliably sterilize lumens exceeding one meter in length and are susceptible to moisture-induced sterilization failure.

The core innovations include a sheet plasma reactor embedded in a flexible pouch for enhanced sterilization and integrated storage, proprietary plasma-in-lumen technology that directly delivers sterilant into endoscope lumens of arbitrary length, and a chamber-free compact system design enabling centralized control of multiple pouches with flexible scheduling. Phase I prototype development successfully demonstrated sterilization efficacy using industry-standard self-contained biological indicators inoculated with Geobacillus stearothermophilus spores and process-challenging devices—a first-of-kind validation for air plasma sterilization in this application. The system's compatibility with multiple gas sources, including dry air and oxygen-rich air, supports commercialization pathways while eliminating toxic gas emissions and labor-intensive processing constraints inherent in conventional endoscope sterilization approaches.