The Srinivasa Ramanujan Institute of Technology in Anantapur has come up with an Atmospheric Movable Cabin (AMC) that claims to provide a 100% safe environment to doctors and paramedical staff for discharging their duties.
Singanamala (SC) MLA Jonnalagadda Padmavathi, who is an M.Tech mechanical post-graduate from JNTU, designed and headed the project team that is currently building the prototype, which is being billed as an alternative to PPEs. The innovation has garnered national recognition.
The project will be funded for research activity and will be commercially marketed by the National Research Development Corporation (NRDC).
These temperature-controlled mobile cabins will be self-sanitising cubicles will be transparent with an in-built flexible hand that can offer 100% protection to doctors and paramedics from contracting not just COVID-19 but any communicable disease, Ms. Padmavathi told The Hindu.
Stating that she was not at liberty to explain the design aspects fully or share pictures in order to abide by the contractual agreement with NRDC, Ms. Padmavathi said they had proposed three alternatives to the corporation, which was busy finalising the specific product.
“It will have a 50% revenue sharing clause as and when it gets commercially produced, which is expected to be at short notice as the project is mainly to deal with the challenges in hospitals during the COVID-19 pandemic. A doctor or nurse can move around in the ICU or general ward with the patients fully visible and patients also able to see who they are interacting with,” she said.
Another positive aspect in the design of the AMC is those using it can sit inside for long hours while on duty in the wards and use their hands normally to jot down details or have a working meal without having to waste a number of disposable PPEs. Weighing roughly 100 kg, it will be portable and foldable to carry to different locations.
Extrapolating this design model, for which they have applied for Intellectual Property Rights registration, these cubicles/cabins can be used in malls or other places where there is a high possibility of infection. Hospitals will have sanitisation centres where ultraviolet rays with 300 to 400 nanometers (nm) would be used before doctors touch anything after coming out of this cubicle or taking inside. This product is now bound to reach several international destinations once commercial production begins, she explains.