In a bid to ensure safety for the doctors working on the front-line in the fight against Covid-19, a university student in Srilanka has developed a 3D printed mask that can destroy disease-producing viruses including the deadly coronavirus.
With the help of nano-technology and ultraviolet laser light, Naveen Malinga Liyanage, who is studying network technology in the second year at NSBM Green University in Homagama has introduced the 3D mask at a time when frontline healthcare workers (both doctors and nurses) and medical support staffs in Bangladesh are getting infected in large number with the Coronavirus for many reasons including poor quality of PPEs (personal protective equipment), especially masks (face covering).
Besides poor quality of the PPEs, community transmission and patients concealing having coronavirus-like symptoms have contributed much to the doctors getting infected with the virus as confirms corona cases keep mounting in the country, said, health experts.
When his attention was drawn to the doctors’ safety, Naveen said surgeons without a pathogen-resistant mask are likely to catch virus easily.
“Normal masks do not kill the virus. There is a good chance of the virus sticking on the surface of the mask while in contact with the patients. If we do not remove the virus, it would be able to be present on hands.”
Claiming that the mask developed by him is 99% virus-resistant, Naveen said he used nanotechnology which acts in avoiding viruses because of resistance, adding that “just like water can not exist on lotus leave.”
To explain how his mask destroys the viruses, the technology student said, “Somehow, as a virus penetrates through the filter, the ultraviolet laser kill the virus trigger behind the filter, refreshing it every five seconds and allowing us to breathe fresh oxygen.”
He mentioned that the mask which was produced using 3D Print Technology costs him 6000 Srilankan Rupees. The newly-introduced mask is yet to get official recognition. But Naveen is adamant that he would request the country’s Prime Minister in this regard (his mask being approved by the authority concerned).
