PREPARATION AND CHARACTERIZATION OF PALM OIL-BASED LOTIONS FOR ORGANOPHOSPHORUS COMPOUND CONTAMINATED SKIN DECONTAMINATION

Abstract

Organophosphorus compounds (OPs) are very toxic chemicals and become a major threat to civilians and military personnel as they are commonly used as pesticides and chemical weapons. Since their penetration rates through human skin are relatively high, an immediate decontamination upon dermal exposure is vital and this can be carried out by applying a lotion containing ingredients that react with the OPs to produce harmless products. As an effort to reduce our dependency on foreign technology which becomes a big threat to our country security and budget, we have been exploring of a possibility of producing our own OP reactive skin decontamination lotion.    In this report we describe a procedure to prepare a palm oil-based lotion that can be used to as a matrix for incorporating active ingredients to remove OPs from an OP contaminated skin.  The pH of the lotion was ranged between 8 to 9 and remained in this range for over 6 months. In addition, there was no phase separation and microbial growth observed when the tests were carried out. The absence of new and major shift of functional groups in the FTIR spectrum of the stored lotion suggested the product was also chemically stable.