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Performance of fabrics for home-made masks against the spread of COVID-19 through droplets: A quantitative mechanistic study

Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) may spread through respiratory droplets released by infected individuals during coughing, sneezing, or speaking. Given the limited supply of professional respirators and face masks, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has recommended home-mad...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Aydin, Onur, Emon, Bashar, Cheng, Shyuan, Hong, Liu, Chamorro, Leonardo P., Saif, M. Taher A.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Elsevier Ltd. 2020
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7417273/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32835043
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.eml.2020.100924
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author Aydin, Onur
Emon, Bashar
Cheng, Shyuan
Hong, Liu
Chamorro, Leonardo P.
Saif, M. Taher A.
author_facet Aydin, Onur
Emon, Bashar
Cheng, Shyuan
Hong, Liu
Chamorro, Leonardo P.
Saif, M. Taher A.
author_sort Aydin, Onur
collection PubMed
description Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) may spread through respiratory droplets released by infected individuals during coughing, sneezing, or speaking. Given the limited supply of professional respirators and face masks, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has recommended home-made cloth face coverings for use by the general public. While there have been several studies on aerosol filtration performance of household fabrics, their effectiveness at blocking larger droplets has not been investigated. Here, we ascertained the performance of 11 common household fabrics at blocking large, high-velocity droplets, using a commercial medical mask as a benchmark. We also assessed the breathability (air permeability), texture, fiber composition, and water absorption properties of the fabrics. We found that most fabrics have substantial blocking efficiency (median values >70%). In particular, two layers of highly permeable fabric, such as T-shirt cloth, blocks droplets with an efficiency (>94%) similar to that of medical masks, while being approximately twice as breathable. The first layer allows about 17% of the droplet volume to transmit, but it significantly reduces their velocity. This allows the second layer to trap the transmitted droplets resulting in high blocking efficacy. Overall, our study suggests that cloth face coverings, especially with multiple layers, may help reduce droplet transmission of respiratory infections. Furthermore, face coverings made from materials such as cotton fabrics allow washing and reusing, and can help reduce the adverse environmental effects of widespread use of commercial disposable and non-biodegradable facemasks.
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spelling pubmed-74172732020-08-11 Performance of fabrics for home-made masks against the spread of COVID-19 through droplets: A quantitative mechanistic study Aydin, Onur Emon, Bashar Cheng, Shyuan Hong, Liu Chamorro, Leonardo P. Saif, M. Taher A. Extreme Mech Lett Article Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) may spread through respiratory droplets released by infected individuals during coughing, sneezing, or speaking. Given the limited supply of professional respirators and face masks, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has recommended home-made cloth face coverings for use by the general public. While there have been several studies on aerosol filtration performance of household fabrics, their effectiveness at blocking larger droplets has not been investigated. Here, we ascertained the performance of 11 common household fabrics at blocking large, high-velocity droplets, using a commercial medical mask as a benchmark. We also assessed the breathability (air permeability), texture, fiber composition, and water absorption properties of the fabrics. We found that most fabrics have substantial blocking efficiency (median values >70%). In particular, two layers of highly permeable fabric, such as T-shirt cloth, blocks droplets with an efficiency (>94%) similar to that of medical masks, while being approximately twice as breathable. The first layer allows about 17% of the droplet volume to transmit, but it significantly reduces their velocity. This allows the second layer to trap the transmitted droplets resulting in high blocking efficacy. Overall, our study suggests that cloth face coverings, especially with multiple layers, may help reduce droplet transmission of respiratory infections. Furthermore, face coverings made from materials such as cotton fabrics allow washing and reusing, and can help reduce the adverse environmental effects of widespread use of commercial disposable and non-biodegradable facemasks. Elsevier Ltd. 2020-10 2020-08-11 /pmc/articles/PMC7417273/ /pubmed/32835043 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.eml.2020.100924 Text en © 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Since January 2020 Elsevier has created a COVID-19 resource centre with free information in English and Mandarin on the novel coronavirus COVID-19. The COVID-19 resource centre is hosted on Elsevier Connect, the company's public news and information website. Elsevier hereby grants permission to make all its COVID-19-related research that is available on the COVID-19 resource centre - including this research content - immediately available in PubMed Central and other publicly funded repositories, such as the WHO COVID database with rights for unrestricted research re-use and analyses in any form or by any means with acknowledgement of the original source. These permissions are granted for free by Elsevier for as long as the COVID-19 resource centre remains active.
spellingShingle Article
Aydin, Onur
Emon, Bashar
Cheng, Shyuan
Hong, Liu
Chamorro, Leonardo P.
Saif, M. Taher A.
Performance of fabrics for home-made masks against the spread of COVID-19 through droplets: A quantitative mechanistic study
title Performance of fabrics for home-made masks against the spread of COVID-19 through droplets: A quantitative mechanistic study
title_full Performance of fabrics for home-made masks against the spread of COVID-19 through droplets: A quantitative mechanistic study
title_fullStr Performance of fabrics for home-made masks against the spread of COVID-19 through droplets: A quantitative mechanistic study
title_full_unstemmed Performance of fabrics for home-made masks against the spread of COVID-19 through droplets: A quantitative mechanistic study
title_short Performance of fabrics for home-made masks against the spread of COVID-19 through droplets: A quantitative mechanistic study
title_sort performance of fabrics for home-made masks against the spread of covid-19 through droplets: a quantitative mechanistic study
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7417273/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32835043
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.eml.2020.100924
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