The shortage of PPE is getting worse, with hundreds of medical professionals and first responders paying the ultimate price. But if the COVID-19 pandemic has taught us anything, it’s that people are resourceful. Scientists at a crime lab in Kansas, for example, deduced a method to use evidence drying cabinets to decontaminate N95 masks for multiple uses. Now, an engineering team from Michigan Tech University has Macgyvered a refrigerated shipping container, commercial-grade baking sheets and modified oven into a prototype mobile sanitation unit.
The team, which includes the family unit of Dan and Amy Barnard and cousin Andrew, is actively working with a team from the FDA to get approval for Emergency Use Authorization so they can make the design and licensing widely available to communities and healthcare facilities.
The design and technology behind the idea is simple, yet ingenious. Swap out the refrigeration unit in a thick-walled shipping container for a heating unit run on an electric generator, line it with stainless steel racks and trays holding PPE, then heat it to 140 to 170 F. The unit can clean 5,000 to 10,000 PPE units every two hours, and can run continuously.
Incredibly, the resources needed for the design are all readily available, even in these trying times. Commercial bakeries, restaurants, HVAC ships, shipping yards and even universities have an abundance of the necessary off-the-shelf parts.
“If Houghton, Michigan, can find 25 racks, the right kind of shipping container, a heating unit and the experts to put a prototype all together in a couple days, then this could be deployed in any city in our nation,” said Dan.
While assembling a team is usually the easy part of developing a new technology, it was the opposite in this case. Amy’s father, Brad Andreae, owner of an industrial finishing system, contributed supplies, while heat processing equipment manufacturer Therma-Tron-X, Inc., weighed in regarding the heating unit. Thermodynamics expert Jeffrey Allen, a professor of mechanical engineering at Michigan Tech, also offered insight into the heating elements.
“[Getting collaborators together] was tough,” Andrew told Laboratory Equipment. “Even just finding a spot to work during the pandemic was challenging. I was fortunate to be able to find a really great group of professors and professional staff to assist in the design and build of this unit. It just took a lot of phone calls to get the right team assembled. It is a testament to the tenacity at Michigan Tech that we were able to go from an idea to a fully functioning prototype in eight days.”
The Mobile Thermal Utility (MTU) Sanitizer, as the inventors are calling it, can not only disinfect small PPE such as lab coats, gowns, N95 masks, face shields and sleeves, but also large items like gurneys, beds and firefighter gear.
Andrew said feedback on the prototype on the local level as been terrific, with multiple Michigan senators and representatives lending whatever help they can. If the FDA grants the prototype Emergency Use Authorization status, the MTU Sanitizer team will work with outside manufacturing partners to provide a build plan and license the technology to them.
“We will work with anyone interested in using or building these units to come up with a path forward that can help the most possible front-line healthcare workers as soon as possible,” Andrew said.
Photo: The "hot" side of the MTU Sanitizer conducts and reflects heat to clean PPE; the “cold” side houses the electrical work to control the shipping container’s environment. Credit: Andrew Barnard