Abstract View
The Effect of Plexiglass Shields on Droplet/Aerosol Transmission of Virus in Indoor Environments
BO YANG, Khaled Hashad, Alfredo Rodriguez, K. Max Zhang, Cornell University
Abstract Number: 591
Working Group: Infectious Aerosols in the Age of COVID-19
Abstract
Several studies showed the potential airborne transmission of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. Social distancing, facial masks, and handwashing have been emphasized to slow down the transmissions. One specific design is the plexiglass shields, which were installed in many indoor environments such as classrooms, restaurants, and banks. The plexiglass shield is a part of the indoor environmental interior structure, affecting the indoor flow field and the virus-contained particle/droplet trajectories. However, there are very little quantitative data showing the effect of the interior structure on particle/droplet transport and fate. The goal of this study is to simulate the SARS-CoV-2 virus contained particles/droplets dynamics in a room. In the simulation, human talking-generated particle/droplet size ranges from 0.6 µm to 750 µm. Both the particle/droplet evaporation and deposition were modeled using computational fluid dynamics (CFD) coupled with the aerosol dynamics. Given this specific indoor layout, the plexiglass shield can significantly increase the deposition ratio, but cannot decrease the airborne ratio. The particle/droplet exhaust ratio would be decreased correspondingly. Our findings indicate the plexiglass shield could be helpful to the large particles/droplets (>100 µm), but not very effective for smaller ones.