Invisible UVC protective wall
Previous measures to protect against corona indoors usually only extend to wearing a mask, ventilation and time and personnel restrictions to a minimum. However, as corona will be with us for longer than originally thought, an additional catalog of measures makes sense. This is where air purifiers and UVC protective walls come into play.
A research team from the Tropical Institute at LMU Klinikum München and the Technical University of Munich has developed these in cooperation with the start-up Smart United GmbH.
In their study published as a preprint, they were able to show that the UV light barrier they developed prevents the spread of pathogens via the air indoors and achieves an inactivation rate of up to 99 percent.
According to manufacturer Smart United GmbH, the protective walls will be available from April 2022 and will be used in care homes and open-plan offices, for example. Wherever the usual precautionary measures are not sufficient due to the number of people and the time they have to spend together.
The UV protection wall acts like an invisible curtain that can separate rooms into sub-compartments. The system consists of UV lamps on the ceiling, combined with an active air intake that directs aerosol particles towards the curtain and thus cleans them. This activates a twofold protection system: on the one hand, the direct barrier effect and, on the other, the reduction of infectious aerosols in the entire room.
The protective wall works without restricting the freedom of movement of the people in the room and can even be walked through. An automatic switch-off device reliably protects people passing through from the radiation emitted.
Anja Fürbach, Market Intelligence Senior Expert
Sources:
- Originalveröffentlichung: „Aerosol decontamination and spatial separation using a free-space LED-based UV-C light curtain“ Andreas Wieser, Jessica Beyerl, Albrecht v. Brunn, Vincent Rieker, Marcus Rieker, Michael Hoelscher, Christoph Haisch. Verfügbar als Preprint unter: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.12.16.21267937
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