Distinction between Sanatizing, Disinfecting, Pasteurizing, and Sterilizing.

Introduction

I often get asked what is the best way to prepare or clean my workspaces, growing tents, and or fruiting chambers. There are several methods and its important to understand the key distinction between the levels of “cleaning” we can achieve. In the order of cleanliness we have:

1. Sanitize

2. Disinfect

3. Pasteurize

4. Sterilize

1. Sanitize

Sanitizing aims to lower the amount of germs to a safe level. The process of sanitizing can involve both cleaning and/or disinfecting.

It’s also worth mentioning that while hand sanitizers may not eliminate all germs, it is good practices to apply some on your gloves or hands between touching materials to minimize cross contamination when doing laboratory work. If you’re not able to or have access to warm water and soap to properly wash your hands between steps.

Sanitizing is my primary method of keeping my work areas clean. Often I will use soap and hot water to remove dirt and germs from surfaces. It is important to use some elbow grease to physically scrub surfaces to remove any built on dirt. This is by far the most important step in order to maintain cleanliness is your myco-lab. Sanitization is often confused with disinfecting or sterilizing. There is a key distinction in the amount of “Bacterial Load” that is removed, this is often between 90 to 99.999%.

2. Disinfected

The process of disinfecting removes harmful organisms from objects. This is usually done by applying chemical sprays or wipes.

When I am not able to scrub an area with soapy water and rinse it, I often will spray on chemicals, let it sit for 10 to 15 minutes then wipe it away with a clean cloth. I usually use a 2% bleach solution to help with any disinfection of my lab space.

3. Pasteurized

Although this isn’t a step for cleaning, I thought I would briefly include it in this distinction between methods of getting rid of germs. Pasteurization is a method of using chemicals or heat to reduce the bacterial/germ load to a level that will preserve “food” in our case grains or substrate to a level suitable for mycelium to grow without having to compete with too many germs.

4. Sterilization

Lastly, we have sterilization which is a process that we use prepare grain and substrate. This process destroys all living bacteria and even can de-activate spores. The best method to achieve sterilization is with heat and pressure, more specifically in excess of 15 PSI and 121 degrees Celsius. This is known as an autoclave or with most hobbyist growers an “Insta-Pot”. Majority of home and consumer pressure vessels don’t achieve the minimum pressures necessary for “True” sterilization as it would require a Certified Pressure Vessel (this means it is registered with regulatory authorities).

I’ve provided some information in the graphs above to mathematically illustrate the effectiveness of each cleaning method, these are standards setout by the scientific community and used by all health authorities when describing “cleanliness”.