The COVID-19 pandemic has created a huge demand for ventilators in hospitals across the world. But in many countries, especially those that are poor, hospitals are struggling to buy enough ventilators to meet their demand for sick patients.
For their senior design project, an innovative team of biomedical engineering students from the University of South Florida set out to solve this problem, and their hard work has paid off with big rewards.
The team constructed a ventilator that can efficiently provide airflow to two patients at the same time. According to USF, the Eucovent ventilator can double a hospital’s ventilator capacity without having to buy more machines, which can cost more than $15,000 a piece.
While traditional ventilators can divide airflow between multiple patients, they cannot customize the air flow. This is a problem since patients require different air flow depending on their unique physical differences. Eucovent solves this problem by adjusting airflow for each patient.
Here’s how the team did it: The students equipped the ventilator with custom valves that can each be adjusted to match each patient’s unique airflow needs. They used a technique known as “multiplexing” that allows the ventilator to alternate between patients, so each patient receives just the right amount of air. They built and tested their device using biomechanics, 3D writing, computer programming and modeling, and computer-aided design, which they learned during their studies.
The students, Carolyna Yamamoto, Alves Pinto, Abby Blocker, and Jacob Yarinsky, developed Eucovent at the request of the Moffitt Cancer Center. They were rewarded $20,000 for their work.
“It’s incredibly gratifying to be acknowledged at this level, especially for something that we believe could one day save lives,” Blocker told USF. “We learned so much through this capstone experience and it really gave us the opportunity to use all of the knowledge and skills we’d gathered during our undergrad.”
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