Self-Cleaning Menstrual Cups with Plant-Based Biodegradable Superabsorbent Fibrous Tablets for Hygienic and Sustainable Period Care
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Menstrual cups are a sustainable and reusable alternative to pads and tampons, offering reduced waste and lower risks of allergies, infections, and toxic shock syndrome. However, their widespread adoption and long-term use are hindered by hygiene concerns, specifically biofouling and the need for messy removal. We report a self-cleaning menstrual cup with a biocompatible silicone oil-infused coating combined with a biodegradable plant-based tablet composed of superabsorbent fibers. The absorbent fibers were designed with cross-linked alginate and optimized to achieve high absorption capacities (8 mL water or 15 mL blood per gram fiber) within 8 h. At the same time, the lubricant-infused cups prolonged clotting times and exhibited self-cleaning properties, with little blood detected on the treated cups and a significant reduction in bacterial adhesion/biofilm formation. The fibrous tablet retained blood in an amount equivalent to the full capacity of the menstrual cup, eliminating spillage during removal and facilitating easy emptying. By removing barriers to comfort and convenience, our design and developed materials present a simple and effective advancement in feminine hygiene products that tip the scale in favor of reusable products and advance global environmental stewardship.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".