The Helmholtz CORAERO project joins scientists from virus biology, medicine, applied physics, chemistry, material science, engineering as well as technology assessment. The aim is to develop knowledge about virus propagation and new inactivation technologies that are important for schools, factories, passenger transport systems and public facilities.
CORAERO aims at broad interdisciplinary contributions to understanding virus spreading through aerosols and designing technical and administrative measures for mitigation and virus control. In CORAERO, the interdisciplinary team is driving research and transfer of novel technologies to inactivate SARS-CoV-2 and other viruses in air and on surfaces.
Scientific and engineering progress in the field requires a collaborative approach that combines new knowledge about virus survival under different conditions and treatments with knowledge from material sciences, fluid dynamics and thermodynamics. Knowledge generation has to go hand in hand with engineering to develop and assess appropriate technologies in strong collaboration between academia and industry. Therefore, CORAERO addresses the following important questions:
CORAERO addresses the following important questions:
How does virus load in aerosol drops correlate with drop size and infection status?
How long does the virus persist on surfaces and in aerosols under different environmental conditions (temperature, humidity, solar flux, ozone concentration)?
How fast do droplets evaporate in a given environment and how does this affect virus inactivation?
When is ventilation optimal in a given space and for dynamic situations
What are the most efficient, safe and cost-effective technologies to inactivate virus-containing aerosols and how can they be safely deployed in public spaces?
Scientists at the DLR Institute of Aerodynamics and Flow Technology are pursuing three parallel approaches to achieve these goals:
Experimental study of aerosol dispersion in the cabin of a passenger aircraft (Do728): With and without a "walking" passenger in the aisle
The dispersion of exhaled particles is being investigated experimentally for different ventilation concepts both in aircraft cabins and in the passenger compartments of rail vehicles at DLR's own research facilities. Different source positions and the influence of movement in the aisle are investigated. Thermal human models, more than 70 particle sensors and a source of aerosolized artificial saliva are used in the realistic cabin geometries.
In parallel, in a newly constructed generic classroom with high optical accessibility, the latest 3D measurement methods are used to record the trajectories of countless helium-filled soap bubbles with high temporal and spatial resolution.
In the third approach, various Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) approaches are used to calculate the highly dynamic formation of the exhaled or coughed aerosol clouds in order to predict the most efficient combined model for predicting the dispersion in public, ventilated areas.
Direct Numerical Simulation (DNS) velocity field and particle dispersion after a cough event in a generically ventilated room
