An innovative faucet for cleaning hands, PPE, ventilator parts etc.

用于清洁手、个人防护装备、呼吸机部件等的创新水龙头。

• 批准号: 54554
• 金额: $ 9.38万
• 依托单位: SLOAN WATER TECHNOLOGY LIMITED
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Feasibility Studies
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2020 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=54554
• 关键词: innovative; faucet; cleaning; hands; PPE

Since 2015 we have been popularising that we should handwash for 2-rounds of 'Happy-Birthday', by building games/science festival exhibits. We showed many children went from it and, for one day at least, sang 'Happy-Birthday' in the toilets. However, what will we do when soap/detergent/bleach gets scarce, as producers/warehouse staff and delivery-drivers fall sick, supply-chains break, and the local supplies in homes/hospitals/warehouses/cruise-ships run out? To prepare for that eventuality, we designed a faucet that can clean with unheated water, without soap. Moreover, when soap, bleach and other additives are available, this device makes them far more effective. Field hospitals need a minimum of water and electricity to run: with this, our device can clean hands/PPE/ventilator parts and food trays etc.The faucet works by passing sound down the stream of water. It has been proven to remove all manner of contaminants. It is safe for skin, and highly effective at removing bacteria and fungi. It was scheduled for an NHS-pilot to clean the contaminant that causes variant-CJD ('mad cow disease'), one of the most difficult contaminants to eliminate. That pilot is now postponed because of COVID-19, and we wish to alter the device in one way, to allow its use more widely for removing Coronavirus. That amendment will prevent the small amount of water droplet-ejection at the nozzle exit: the ejected droplets are clean, uncontaminated water, but we cannot provide a product that ejects droplets, even with no risk of contamination, in an environment where everyone should be automatically avoiding droplets.Our 6-month workplan will eliminate this droplet-ejection, removing an obstacle that is stopping us scaling-up production to supply the new-build hospitals (in the first instance) and the cruise ships to use these faucets, and for existing establishments to replace existing taps with them as needed. We then wish to further scale-up to supply homes, so that cleaning with warm soapy water can be made more effective; and so that those items we currently must clean in unheated water (salad, fruit) or mildly heated water with low concentrations of chemicals (the skin of babies) can be effectively cleaned. When such faucets are widely used, they will be equally effective from day one of the next pandemic, without the need to wait 12-months for vaccines and cures.The average hand washing lasts 6s, not the recommended 20s: our faucets should make those 6s as effective as 20s under a traditional faucet.An extension for impact funding will allow Sloan Water Technology Ltd. (SWT) to conduct work to improve the manufacturability of expensive and complex parts of our ultrasonic water-tap, through design for manufacture and working with suppliers to reduce their piece cost at volume. These complex parts are critical to the performance of the device, so addressing these issues earlier on in the development cycle will reduce risk of any changes made and remove the additional testing that would be required if the changes were introduced later in the cycle. In this way we hope eventually to make widely available ultrasonic water-taps that perform two functions. The primary function is that, when soap is available, people will get, within the 6s the average person devotes to handwashing, a cleaning experience equivalent to 20s under a traditional water-tap. The secondary function is that when soap is not available (because of interruptions or delays to the production/distribution/supply chain because of illness, or panic-buying, for households, ambulances, clinics, Nightingale hospitals, cruise ships etc.) especially at the start of a pandemic, a useful level, of cleaning can still be achieved. In this way we hope to break the chain of infection from person-to-person, not just for viral pandemics such as COVID-19, but for future pandemics, which may be bacterial or fungal and for which the vaccines developed to combat COVID-19 will be ineffective.

自2015年以来，我们通过举办游戏/科学节展览，普及两轮“生日快乐”时应该洗手的知识。我们展示了许多孩子都摆脱了它，并且至少有一天在厕所里唱着“生日快乐”。然而，当肥皂/洗涤剂/漂白剂变得稀缺，生产商/仓库工作人员和送货司机生病，供应链中断，以及家庭/医院/仓库/游轮的当地供应耗尽时，我们该怎么办？为了应对这种情况，我们设计了一种水龙头，可以用未加热的水进行清洁，无需肥皂。此外，当有肥皂、漂白剂和其他添加剂时，该装置可以使它们更加有效。野战医院需要最少的水和电来运行：有了这个，我们的设备可以清洁手/个人防护装备/呼吸机部件和食物托盘等。水龙头通过将声音沿着水流传递来工作。已被证明可以去除各种污染物。它对皮肤安全，并且能够非常有效地去除细菌和真菌。计划由 NHS 飞行员清理导致变异型克雅氏病（“疯牛病”）的污染物，这是最难消除的污染物之一。由于 COVID-19，该试点现已推迟，我们希望以一种方式改变该设备，以使其更广泛地用于消除冠状病毒。该修正案将防止喷嘴出口处的少量水滴喷射：喷射的水滴是干净、未受污染的水，但我们无法在每个人都应该自动避开水滴的环境中提供喷射水滴的产品，即使没有污染风险。我们的 6 个月工作计划将消除这种水滴喷射，消除阻碍我们扩大生产以供应新建产品的障碍 医院（首先）和游轮使用这些水龙头，并让现有机构根据需要用它们替换现有水龙头。我们希望进一步扩大供应家庭的规模，使温肥皂水的清洁效果更加有效；从而使目前必须用不加热的水（沙拉、水果）或低浓度化学物质的微温水（婴儿的皮肤）清洗的物品能够得到有效的清洗。当此类水龙头被广泛使用时，它们从下一次大流行的第一天起就同样有效，而无需等待 12 个月的疫苗和治疗方法。平均洗手时间为 6 秒，而不是建议的 20 秒：我们的水龙头应该使这 6 秒与传统水龙头下的 20 秒一样有效。影响力资金的延期将使仕龙水技术有限公司 (SWT) 能够开展工作，以提高昂贵和昂贵的洗手液的可制造性。 我们的超声波水龙头的复杂零件，通过设计制造并与供应商合作，以批量降低其单件成本。这些复杂的部件对于设备的性能至关重要，因此在开发周期的早期解决这些问题将降低所做任何更改的风险，并消除在周期后期引入更改时所需的额外测试。通过这种方式，我们希望最终能够广泛使用具有两种功能的超声波水龙头。主要功能是，当肥皂出现时，人们在普通人洗手的6秒内就能获得相当于传统水龙头下20秒的清洁体验。第二个功能是，当无法获得肥皂时（由于家庭、救护车、诊所、南丁格尔医院、游轮等因疾病或恐慌性购买而导致生产/分销/供应链中断或延迟），特别是在大流行开始时，仍然可以达到有用的清洁水平。通过这种方式，我们希望打破人与人之间的感染链，不仅针对 COVID-19 等病毒性大流行，而且针对未来的大流行，这些大流行可能是细菌性或真菌性的，而为对抗 COVID-19 开发的疫苗将无效。