what is the ingredient added to soap that makes it anti-bacterial?
In: Chemistry
I think you’re asking about the soaps that are sold specifically as antibacterial, like they say “kills 99.9% of common household bacteria” or something like that? Like others said lye in soap does act as an antibacterial agent but those soaps have actual antibiotics (drug type) added to them. The antibiotic drugs we use are really just a molecule that we discovered somehow interferes with bacteria and kills them.
Since the antibiotic is just some small molecule, you can just put some of it in the soap and it will dissolve. That’s literally it. To make those claims and test for safety they would test lots of different doses of antibiotics in the soap, test it on a surface and take samples before and after to see how many fewer bacteria are in the soap to find the correct concentration of antibiotic to use.
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