Abstract:
Infectious diseases (such as influenza, SARS and tuberculosis) has always been a great threat to human health, causing numerous deaths and enormous economic loss. It is therefore of essential importance to identify the exact underlying mechanism of exposure before developing corresponding prevention methods. The transmission of disease is not only a biological but also engineering issue in terms of fluid flow and particle transport. People tend to spend approximately 90% of their time in ventilated indoor environments such as offices, classrooms and commute transportation, frequently conducting close contact (<1.5m-2m by definition) with other people. Therefore the susceptibility can be dramatically increased in such a shorter distance. The speaker tries to address this issue from the perspective of CFD simulations coupled with human respiratory activities and body movements, and also the perspective of theoretical calculation of short range airborne and large droplet routes.