Curved-crease origami face shields for infection control

Aurimas Bukauskas; Antiopi Koronaki; Ting-Uei Lee; Daniel Ott; M Wesam Al Asali; Aftab Jalia; Tom Bashford; Ana Gatóo; Josh Newman; Joseph M Gattas; Darshil U Shah; Michael Ramage

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0245737

Curved-crease origami face shields for infection control

PLoS One. 2021 Feb 8;16(2):e0245737. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0245737. eCollection 2021.

Authors

Affiliations

¹ Centre for Natural Material Innovation, Department of Architecture, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom.
² School of Civil Engineering, University of Queensland, St. Lucia, Australia.
³ Department of History and Philosophy of Science, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom.
⁴ NIHR Global Health Research Group on Neurotrauma, Division of Anaesthesia, Addenbrooke's Hospital, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom.
⁵ Healthcare Design Group, Engineering Design Centre, Department of Engineering, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom.
⁶ School of Media, University of Brighton, Brighton, United Kingdom.

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has created enormous global demand for personal protective equipment (PPE). Face shields are an important component of PPE for front-line workers in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, providing protection of the face from splashes and sprays of virus-containing fluids. Existing face shield designs and manufacturing procedures may not allow for production and distribution of face shields in sufficient volume to meet global demand, particularly in Low and Middle-Income countries. This paper presents a simple, fast, and cost-effective curved-crease origami technique for transforming flat sheets of flexible plastic material into face shields for infection control. It is further shown that the design could be produced using a variety of manufacturing methods, ranging from manual techniques to high-volume die-cutting and creasing. This demonstrates the potential for the design to be applied in a variety of contexts depending on available materials, manufacturing capabilities and labour. An easily implemented and flexible physical-digital parametric design methodology for rapidly exploring and refining variations on the design is presented, potentially allowing others to adapt the design to accommodate a wide range of ergonomic and protection requirements.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

COVID-19 / prevention & control*
COVID-19 / virology
Humans
Imaging, Three-Dimensional
Personal Protective Equipment*
Photogrammetry
SARS-CoV-2 / physiology

Grants and funding

This research forms part of Centre for Digital Built Britain’s work within the Construction Innovation Hub. The funding was provided through the Government’s modern industrial strategy by Innovate UK, part of UK Research and Innovation (MHR, DUS, AB, AK, AJ). https://www.cdbb.cam.ac.uk/ The research was supported by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Brain Injury MedTech Co-operative based at Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and University of Cambridge (MHR, TB). https://www.brainmic.nihr.ac.uk/ The views expressed are those of the authors and not necessarily those of the NHS, the NIHR or the Department of Health and Social Care. DUS and MHR thank the INTERREG IV Cross Channel programme for partial funding of this work through the FLOWER project. http://flower-project.eu/ The University of Queensland authors (TL, JMG) gratefully acknowledge the financial support provided by the Australian Research Council DP160103279. https://researchdata.edu.au/discovery-projects-grant-id-dp160103279/664162 The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.