Article 1: https://interestingengineering.com/robotic-covid-19-testing-lab-begins-trials-at-uc-berkeley
Article 2: https://www.theengineer.co.uk/exovent-covid-19-ventilator/
Infrastructure refers to all the systems necessary to help a city function properly. Some examples of infrastructure given in the article were the sewer systems, roads, power grids, etc. Since all prevalent cities today have existed for a long time, the infrastructures they stand on have become outdated or broken. In todays modern age engineers and scientists have to work together to design and innovate infrastructures that also take into account current environmental concerns. The main problem is within urban areas that are vulnerable to events that can impact the systems. This has become abundantly clear in Urban areas like New York and parts of New Jersey since the spread of the COVID-19 virus.
Amidst a pandemic such as this our infrastructure has failed especially in the medical department due to its inability to attend to the sheer volume of patients.. The scientists at UC Berkeley have stepped up in this pandemic to aid using a robotic testing apparatus that can detect over 1,000 COVID-19 patients per day. At the University of California’s Berkeley’s Innovative Genomics Institute (IGI), they have designed a pop-up labratory as a joint effort by a team of corporate partners and volunteers to attend to the high demand of testing capacity to people with symptoms of COVID-19.
“The UC Berkeley team is racing to address this critical public health situation by establishing a testing lab that will be immediately impactful in our community, while also generating data that contributes to understanding the spread of the SARS-CoV-2 virus,” said Jennifer Doudna who is an IGI executive director and professor of molecular and cell biology and chemistry, according to the UC Berkeley blog.
Besides N-95 masks and Lysol the items in highest demand have become ventilators. The COVID-19 virus is a respiratory virus which inevitably leads to the need for a breathing aid which comes in the form of ventilators. Due to the lack of proactivity the Marshall Aerospace and Defense Group is exploring the technical aspects of the scheme ahead of rapid production and roll-out of Negative Pressure Ventilator (NPV). Two intensive care units have agreed to trial the prototype ventilator support devices. The iron lung has been reimagined by a multidisciplinary team to potentially give the NHS (National Health Service) an alternative model of ventilator to treat Covid-19 patients.
When in use, the device is placed over the patient’s torso and begins to takes over their breathing through q process of repeating gentle pressure. It is claimed to increase the heart’s efficiency by up to 25% compared to the conventional ventilators which squeeze the chest, which in turn can potentially reducing cardiac function. The exovent is also less likely to cause a pneumothorax which is the medical term for a burst lung. This is because negative pressure ventilatiors produce less micro-trauma damage to the lung, and it does not require the same medical-grade compressed gases, which are currently at risk of shortage in the NHS due to heavy levels of demand for oxygen caused by the pandemic.
