Researchers in Australia have developed a flexible acrylic film embedded with tiny structures that can effectively eliminate viruses in under an hour, and notably, it doesn’t use any chemical agents. This material has potential applications on surfaces in hospitals and in consumer electronics.
A team from RMIT University in Melbourne has shown that the geometry of the surface itself can mechanically damage the outer layers of enveloped viruses without the need for any chemical additives. Their study was published in the journal Advanced Science in February 2026.
How the Material Works
The film’s surface is covered with arrays of nanopillars, each just billionths of a meter in size, created through a technique known as ultraviolet nanoimprint lithography. When a virus lands on this surface, the nanopillars compress against the viral envelope at the same time, stretching it until it tears. According to the study, it’s not about a single spike puncturing the virus; rather, it’s about multiple pillars pushing on the virus’s shell collectively.
The research team explored various configurations by changing the height and spacing of the nanopillars. They found that spacing—referred to as pitch—was significantly more crucial than height. For example, there was a 94 percent reduction in the infectivity of human parainfluenza virus type 3 (hPIV-3) when the pillars were spaced just 60 nanometers apart. Increasing the spacing to 100 nanometers still showed some effect, but at 200 nanometers, the antiviral activity completely vanished.
“By adjusting the spacing and height of the nanopillars, we realized that how tightly packed they are is far more critical for breaking apart viruses,” said Samson Mah, the study’s lead author. He’s a Ph.D. candidate at RMIT. “When the nanopillars are closer together, they can push on the same virus simultaneously, making it stretch beyond its breaking point.”
The researchers conducted tests using reverse transcription quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR) to confirm that the viral RNA stayed intact across all surfaces tested. The results indicated that the viral envelope was damaged, which led to a loss of infectivity, but the genetic material inside remained unharmed, ruling out any chemical interaction with the material.
Finite element simulations using COMSOL Multiphysics software corroborated these findings. The models illustrated that densely packed arrays consistently generated stresses greater than 10 megapascals where the viral envelope bent between the pillars, exceeding the estimated rupture threshold for the fatty outer membrane of hPIV-3.
Scalability and Limitations
A notable advantage of this research is the choice of materials. Previous work utilized rigid silicon, which limited the deployment of such films. The RMIT team opted for an acrylic resin on a polyethylene terephthalate (PET) backing, resulting in a film that feels smooth to the touch yet retains its nanoscale texture. The manufacturing process is compatible with roll-to-roll production, suggesting that large quantities could potentially be made using existing equipment.
According to Distinguished Professor Elena Ivanova, a senior author of the study, the team is excited to move toward commercial development. “We believe this texturing has great potential for everyday use, and we are eager to collaborate with companies for large-scale manufacturing,” she stated.
However, some questions remain. The study mainly focused on hPIV-3, an enveloped virus that is relatively vulnerable to mechanical disruption. Non-enveloped viruses, which don’t have this outer layer, may react quite differently, and there’s no data on how they would interact with this material yet. Additionally, curved surfaces may complicate matters by altering the spacing between the pillars, which could weaken the antiviral effect. The material does degrade over time, although specific details about the rate or conditions are not provided in the study.
This research builds on an earlier study from RMIT that involved silicon nanospikes, which showed a 96 percent reduction in hPIV-3 infectivity over six hours. The new acrylic film achieves similar results in just one hour, while also being cheaper, lighter, and more suitable for large-scale production.
