Reducing chances of COVID-19 infection by a cough cloud in a closed space F Submitted: 11 September 2020 . Accepted: 21 September 2020 . Published Online: 20 October 2020 Cite as: Phys. Fluids 32, 101704 (2020); https://doi.org/10.1063/5.0029186 Physics of Fluids Amit Agrawal iD, and Rajneesh Bhardwaj iD COLLECTIONS Paper published as part of the special topic on Flow and the Virus This paper was selected as Featured CrossMark
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Phys. Fluids 32, 101704 (2020); https://doi.org/10.1063/5.0029186
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Reducing chances of cOVID-19 infection by a cough cloud in a closed space e
Cite as: Phys. Fluids 32, 101704 (2020): doi: 10.1063/5.0029186 Submitted: 11 September 2020 : Accepted: 21 September 2020 : Published Online: 20 October 2020
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Amit Agrawala D and Rajneesh Bhardwaja
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Note: This paper is part of the Special Topic, Flow and the Virus. aAuthors to whom correspondence should be addressed: amit.agrawal@iitb.ac.in and rajneesh.bhardwaj@iitb.ac.in
ABSTRACT The cough of a COVID-19 infected subject contaminates a large volume of surrounding air with coronavirus due to the entrainment of surrounding air in the jet-like flow created by the cough. In the present work, we estimate this volume of the air, which may help us to desi
trends in human cough airflows at large distances," Phys. Fluids 32, 081905 (2020)] have shown that the velocity in a cough-cloud decay exponentially with distance. We analyze the data further to estimate the volume of the cough-cloud in the presence and absence of a face mask. Assuming a self-similar nature of the cough-cloud, we find that the volume entrained in the cloud varies as V =,0666recd is the spread rate and de is the final distance traveled by the cough-cloud. The volume of the cough-cloud without a mask is about 7 and times larger than in the presence of a surgical mask and an N95 mask, respectively. We also find that the cough-cloud is present for 5 s-8 after which the cloud starts dissipating, irrespective of the presence or absence of a mask. Our analysis suggests that the cough-cloud finally attains the room temperature, while remaining slightly more moist than the surrounding. These findings are expected to have implications in understanding the spread of coronavirus, which is reportedly airborne. PublishedunderlicensebyAIPPublishing.https://doi.org/10.1063/5.0029186
The role of respiratory droplets in spreading the present to maintain freshness, reducing chances of the infection. It also helps COVID-19 pandemic, caused by_SARS-CoV-2 virus particles orus to calculate various thermodynamics parameters, such as temper- coronavirus, is well documented. -6 There are also reports about theature and relative humidity, which affect the dro