The future of menstruation might look a little different than today, if a team of Virginia scientists has anything to say. They’ve created pads and cups that can solidify menstrual blood rather than simply absorbing or containing it as is. Their innovation should reduce leaks and spills, while also being environmentally friendly, according to the team.
Researchers at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and Virginia State University have developed the next-generation menstrual technology. The team primarily studies the gut microbiome and bacteriophages (viruses that attack bacteria), but is also interested in biomaterials, substances that can safely interact with our bodies, either to support, replace, or even enhance a biological function. Lab leader Bryan Hsu wanted his next project to focus on a topic that had received relatively little attention elsewhere, and that’s where he settled on menstruation.
“Menstrual hygiene products have been based on the same principles for a very long time: either retention or absorption,” Hsu told Gizmodo in an email. “With so much biotech progress in other areas of health, I was surprised to learn that there has been comparatively little progress in menstrual care.”
While these existing methods may be effective most of the time, a woman’s heavy flow can overwhelm a pad or cup, leading to leaks. Hsu thought that one way to counteract this problem would be to make the blood itself harder to pass.
“When I formulated this idea in my naive mind, I imagined drinking a full glass of water in the middle of the night. I know I would 100% spill the water when I went back to bed. But I am also pretty sure I would not spill a glass full of sand (solid), honey (very viscous) or jello (a gel),” he explained. “So we tried to design a product that would gel the blood so that it would be easier to manage without spilling.”
The team, which included several women, ultimately settled on a mixture of alginate powder, a polymer derived from seaweed, and glycerol (a natural alcohol). In experiments simulating menstruation with real blood, the addition of powder prevented more leakage from a sanitary pad and significantly more spillage from a cup compared to their conventional counterparts. These ingredients are also biodegradable and already widely added to other products, including food. And if the team’s technology can make reusable cups more appealing, it could help reduce the considerable amount of waste produced by disposable tampons and pads. The team’s conclusions were published Wednesday in the newspaper Matter.
This isn’t the first attempt to reinvent the menstruation wheel, an undertaking that hasn’t always gone smoothly. The advent of superabsorbent tampons in the early 1980s inadvertently sparked outbreaks of toxic shock syndrome, a potentially deadly illness caused by the proliferation of certain strains of toxin-producing bacteria, including Staphylococcus aureusFortunately, the prompt recall of these products and better guidance on tampon use finally put an end to the toxic shock terror.
Period-related toxic shock remains very rare today and is still primarily associated with tampons, but cases can also occur in women using cups and pads. Since alginate can also be food for certain bacteria, Hsu’s team wanted to get ahead of the game and proactively reduce the risk of toxic shock, but without potentially harming the natural vaginal microbiome.
“We added a cationic polysaccharide to our formulation that would entangle with our material and minimize leaching of the material,” Hsu said. “We found that it did not compromise the gelling function when mixed with blood, but also reduced the growth of S. aureus in the material.
Despite the team’s innovative approach to solidifying menstrual blood, their product is still a long way from being available on the shelves of your local pharmacy. The team will need to clearly demonstrate that their creation can meet the regulatory standards of other FDA-approved menstrual products, including safety. They will also need to ensure that it can be scaled while remaining affordable. But the team is very hopeful about developing their technology at a commercial scale and is already planning further iterations.
“We are also working on a tampon-like formulation and targeting other applications in women’s health that we believe can have a significant impact on quality of life,” Hsu said.
