Scientists view the “transition state” of a photochemical reaction in real-time

Researchers used ultrafast electron diffraction to image the structure of the pericyclic minimum, the “transition state” of electrocyclic reactions.

Peer-Reviewed Publication

DOE/US DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY

 

IMAGE: ARTIST’S ILLUSTRATION OF THE OBSERVED PHOTOCHEMICAL “TRANSITION STATE” STRUCTURE (CENTER). THIS STATE LASTS LESS THAN ONE MILLIONTH OF ONE MILLIONTH OF A SECOND. view more 

CREDIT: IMAGE COURTESY OF GREG STEWART, SLAC NATIONAL ACCELERATOR LABORATORY

The Science

In chemical reactions, molecules proceed during their transformation from reactants into reaction products through a critical geometry. In chemistry, geometry refers to the arrangement of atoms in a molecule. Scientists often call critical geometry in reactions a transition state. This state has an almost incomprehensibly short lifetime of less than one millionth of one millionth of a second. Scientists recently captured a critical geometry using the ultra-high speed “electron camera” at SLAC. In combination with quantum simulations of the reaction, this allowed researchers to identify the critical structure as one end of the molecule bending away from the rest of the molecule.

The Impact

Chemists use the reaction investigated in this study, a so-called electrocyclic reaction, because it generates very specific reaction products. These products can be predicted by the Woodward-Hoffmann rules. These rules received the Nobel Prize in chemistry in 1981 and are taught to every organic chemist during their undergraduate education. However, the rules do not give a detailed answer why reactions generate only specific reaction products. The new results help to address this open question. Additionally, they open a path for researchers to create new rules for other types of reactions. This can help make organic chemistry a more powerful tool.

Summary

Electrocyclic reactions are characterized by the simultaneous formation and dissociation of multiple chemical bonds through one critical geometry. In the case of alpha-terpinene, the molecule studied in this project, two double bonds and one single bond are transformed into three double bonds. The synchronization of these processes and the single critical configuration ensure their stereospecificity, a characteristic that makes them an important tool for synthetic chemistry. The stereospecificity can be predicted by the well-known Woodward-Hoffmann rules.

The present study investigated a photochemical (i.e., light-triggered) electrocyclic ring-opening reaction with a combination of ultrafast electron diffraction and simulations of the reaction dynamics in alpha-terpinene. The Woodward-Hoffmann rules predict that the stereospecificity of the reaction in alpha-terpinene is ensured by a rotation of the ends of the emerging chain-like reaction product away from each other in the same clockwise or counter-clockwise direction. The new results suggest that the origins of the stereospecificity do not lie in the exact nature of the motion. Instead, the stereospecificity is determined by the fact that the change from two to three double bonds has largely already happened when the molecule assumes the critical geometry. The single bond dissociation, which leads to the opening of the alpha-terpinene ring, happens later, during the transformation of the molecule from the critical geometry to the reaction products.

 

Funding

This work was supported by the AMOS program in the Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Science, Basic Energy Sciences, Chemical Sciences, Geosciences, and Biosciences Division. MeV-UED is operated as part of the Linac Coherent Light Source at the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, supported in part by the DOE Office of Science, Office of Basic Energy Sciences, SUF Division Accelerator and Detector R&D program, the LCLS Facility, and SLAC. Study coauthor David Sanchez was supported by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.

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JOURNAL

Nature Communications

DOI

10.1038/s41467-023-38513-6 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Experimental study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

Rehybridization dynamics into the pericyclic minimum of an electrocyclic reaction imaged in real-time

 

Researchers develop smartphone app that reliably recognizes physical signs of stroke

Reports and Proceedings

SOCIETY OF NEUROINTERVENTIONAL SURGERY

SAN DIEGO—Today at the Society of NeuroInterventional Surgery’s (SNIS) 20th Annual Meeting, researchers discussed a smartphone app created that reliably recognizes patients’ physical signs of stroke with the power of machine learning.

 

In the study, “Smartphone-Enabled Machine Learning Algorithms for Autonomous Stroke Detection,” researchers from the UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine and multiple medical institutions in Bulgaria used data from 240 patients with stroke at four metropolitan stroke centers. Within 72 hours of the start of the patients’ symptoms, researchers used smartphones to record videos of patients and test their arm strength in order to detect patients’ facial asymmetry, arm weakness, and speech changes—all classic stroke signs.

 

To evaluate facial asymmetry, the study authors used machine learning to analyze 68 facial landmark points. To test arm weakness, the team used data from a smartphone’s standard internal 3D accelerometer, gyroscope, and magnetometer. To determine speech changes, researchers used mel-frequency cepstral coefficients, a typical sound recognition method that translates sound waves into images, to compare normal and slurred speech patterns. They then tested the app using neurologists’ reports and brain scan data, finding that the app was sensitive and specific enough to diagnose stroke accurately in nearly all cases.

 

“It’s exciting to think how this app and the emerging technology of machine learning will help more patients identify stroke symptoms upon onset,” said Dr. Radoslav Raychev, a vascular and interventional neurologist from UCLA’s David Geffen School of Medicine. “Quickly and accurately assessing symptoms is imperative to ensure that people with stroke survive and regain independence. We hope the deployment of this app changes lives and the field of stroke care.”

 

To receive a copy of this abstract or to speak with the study authors, please contact Camille Jewell at cjewell@vancomm.com or at 202-248-5460.

 

About the Society of NeuroInterventional Surgery

The Society of NeuroInterventional Surgery (SNIS) is a scientific and educational association dedicated to advancing the specialty of neurointerventional surgery through research, standard-setting, and education and advocacy to provide the highest quality of patient care in diagnosing and treating diseases of the brain, spine, head, and neck. Visit www.snisonline.org and follow us on Twitter (@SNISinfo) and Facebook (@SNISOnline).

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Scientists dig into wildfire predictions, long-term impacts

Peer-Reviewed Publication

DOE/OAK RIDGE NATIONAL LABORATORY

 

IMAGE: ORNL’S FERNANDA SANTOS EXAMINES A SOIL SAMPLE AT AN NGEE ARCTIC FIELD SITE IN THE ALASKAN TUNDRA IN JUNE 2022. view more 

CREDIT: AMY BREEN, UNIVERSITY OF ALASKA FAIRBANKS

Wildfires are an ancient force shaping the environment, but they have grown in frequency, range and intensity in response to a changing climate. At the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory, scientists are working on several fronts to better understand and predict these events and what they mean for the carbon cycle and biodiversity.

Two months into the 2023 peak summer fire season from June through August, Canadian wildfires had burned more than 25 million acres of land, disrupted the lives of millions and spread beyond the traditional confines of western Canada east to Nova Scotia. The phenomenon attracted renewed attention as smoke drifted to heavily populated regions, turning the New York City skyline orange and drifting across the Atlantic Ocean to Europe by late June.

Understanding the many risks and impacts of wildfires is at the heart of several projects at ORNL. Henriette “Yetta” Jager, an ORNL scientist whose research sits at the intersection of energy and ecology, has studied how selective forest thinning can both remove fuel for wildfires and provide plant material for conversion into biofuels.

“It’s a complex topic,” Jager said. “The science is showing that although it may be difficult to remove undergrowth and thin trees in some roadless areas, simply leaving old growth forest alone may cause more harm than good. For at-risk species such as spotted owls, letting fuel build up can cause larger and more widespread fires that can be worse in the long run.”

Jager has worked with colleagues to build a framework that can support decision-making around forest-thinning practices, landscape patterns and even spatial firefighting tactics. Results of their work could be used to protect terrestrial and aquatic species that need safe passage to move away from wildfire and then return later.

“Wildfire disturbance is a part of nature, and species are adapted to it, but we’re in a different situation now with climate change,” Jager said. “There are going to be big shifts in when these fires happen, their size and severity, which will cause big shifts in vegetation and new impacts on animal species.

“By continuing our research, we can help forest managers plan for these shifts.”

Unearthing data in the carbon-rich Arctic tundra

Advancing the understanding of wildfire effects on the carbon cycle is a focus for ORNL scientist Fernanda Santos. She studies not only single events, but also repeated wildfires over decades. She examines what these fires portend for the land’s ability to lock away carbon. And, conversely, her work evaluates how fires can become a source of carbon emissions during wildfires and potentially intensify the warming cycle. The world’s soils hold more than 3 gigatons of carbon — triple the amount in the atmosphere — and roughly 70% of the top layer of all soils has been exposed to fire at some point.

Her research illuminates the anticipated changes as the land evolves in response to fire. “A lot of people think of evolution as something that happens over centuries,” Santos said. “But the idea of rapid evolution, including how plants and soil microbiomes rapidly adapt to increased fires, is relatively new. Will we see more or less biodiversity after repeated fires? Ultimately, we want to know how fire affects these environments, including belowground.”

Fire affects plant functional traits as well as the diversity and function of microbes and other organisms in and around the soil that can alter plant and soil quality, Fernanda and colleagues said in a special issue of Functional Ecology examining knowledge gaps in the study of wildfire evolutionary impacts. Changes in wildfire regimes related to a hotter climate, like greater recurrence and severity, have been reported to accelerate the transition from tree- to shrub-dominated ecosystems, for instance. Fire’s evolutionary influence can be seen in the selection of plants with traits such as thicker bark and fast germination and resprouting and can result in less plant diversity.

The scientists also pointed to the need for more research into how fire may affect plant-fungal interactions in forests. More severe and repeated wildfire may also impact the sensory cues that animals, including insects, pollinators and herbivores, typically use to avoid fire and result in additional implications for biodiversity in a changing climate, the scientists said.

At ORNL, Santos works on projects like the DOE Next-Generation Ecosystem Experiments Arctic, or NGEE Arctic, performing experiments and collecting observational data to better understand changes happening in Arctic ecosystems. She concentrates on disturbance ecology — what events such as wildfires and pest outbreaks mean for the environment and future climate feedbacks. She examines the organic and inorganic chemistry of the Arctic topsoil,  which helps insulate the tundra’s carbon-rich permafrost layer.

Refining large-scale climate simulations

Santos is also helping refine large-scale simulations of the Earth’s climate, such as DOE’s Energy Exascale Earth System Model, to better represent different forms of carbon like charred biomass — soot and charcoal — that result from wildfire. E3SM is supported by the DOE Office of Science’s Biological and Environmental Research Program and spans eight national labs, including ORNL. The model runs on the world’s fastest supercomputers, providing highly advanced simulations to better predict environmental change that could affect the energy sector.

All of that work depends on the quality and quantity of observational and experimental data. To enhance wildfire- related datasets, Santos and ORNL colleague Jiafu Mao have launched a Fire Community Database Network to encourage scientists and land managers to submit environmental data on burned areas to a central repository. Sharing such information can not only improve research, but also inform land management practices, the scientists said.

Wildfires consume not only the biomass of plants and trees, but can also result in the release of carbon that has been stored in soils for years or centuries, Santos said. “Our work in the Arctic is focused on a better understanding of what may happen in these carbon-rich soils in higher latitudes like Alaska and Canada. We model and predict the land carbon cycle, and I’m focused on helping decrease the uncertainty in those models with field data about historical fires.”

More detail on ORNL’s modeling and simulation work around wildfire is available in this recent article.

Support for the projects comes from the DOE BER program, the DOE Office of Energy Efficiency & Renewable Energy’s Bioenergy Technologies Office, and ORNL Laboratory Directed Research and Development.

UT-Battelle manages ORNL for DOE’s Office of Science, the single largest supporter of basic research in the physical sciences in the United States. The Office of Science is working to address some of the most pressing challenges of our time. For more information, please visit energy.gov/science. 

A NASA satellite image from June 8, 2022, reflects smoke and red “hot spots” of wildfire resulting from more than a dozen active fires in southwest Alaska, as the largest tundra fire on record at the time burned hundreds of thousands of acres in the Yukon Delta.

CREDIT

NASA MODIS

JOURNAL

Functional Ecology

DOI

10.1111/1365-2435.14387 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Commentary/editorial

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

The eco-evolutionary role of fire in shaping terrestrial ecosystems

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

2-Aug-2023

 

Sea urchins are struggling to ‘get a grip’ as climate change alters ecosystems

Syracuse University researchers explore how excess freshwater from climate change-associated events such as increased torrential rainstorms are impacting sea urchin survival

Peer-Reviewed Publication

SYRACUSE UNIVERSITY

 

IMAGE: SYRACUSE UNIVERSITY BIOLOGISTS CO-AUTHORED A STUDY EXPLORING HOW SEA URCHIN ADHESIVE ABILITIES ARE AFFECTED BY DIFFERING LEVELS OF WATER SALINITY. view more 

CREDIT: SYRACUSE UNIVERSITY

When driving through a rainstorm, traction is key. If your tires lack sufficient tread, your vehicle will slip and slide and you won’t have the grip needed to maneuver safely. When torrential rains hit nearshore, shallow water ecosystems, sea urchins experience a similar challenge. Heavy precipitation can alter the concentration of salt in the ocean waters causing lower salinity levels. Even a slight change in salinity can affect the ability of sea urchins to securely attach their tube feet to their surroundings – like tires gripping the road. This becomes a matter of life and death for the small spiny creatures, as they rely on their adhesive structures to move in the wave-battered rocky area near the seashore.

Syracuse University biologists co-authored a study exploring how sea urchin adhesive abilities are affected by differing levels of water salinity.

The survival of sea urchins is vital for maintaining balance within marine ecosystems. Sea urchins are responsible for grazing around 45% of algae on coral reefs. Without sea urchins, coral reefs can become overgrown with macroalgae, which can limit the growth of corals. With the importance of coral reefs for coastal protection and preservation of biodiversity, it is critical to safeguard the sea urchin population.

As global climate change causes weather extremes ranging from heat waves and droughts to heavy rains and flooding, the large amounts of freshwater pouring into nearshore ecosystems are altering habitats. A team of biologists, led by Austin Garner, assistant professor in the College of Arts and Sciences’ Department of Biology, studied the impacts of low salinity and how it alters sea urchins’ ability to grip and move within their habitat. Garner, who is a member of Syracuse University’s BioInspired Institute, studies how animals attach to surfaces in variable environments from the perspective of both the life and physical sciences.

The team’s study, recently published in the Journal of Experimental Biology, sought to understand how sea urchin populations will be affected by future extreme climatic events.

“While many marine animals can regulate the amount of water and salts in their bodies, sea urchins are not as effective at this,” says Garner. “As a result, they tend to be restricted to a narrow range of salinity levels. Torrential precipitation can cause massive amounts of freshwater to be dumped into the ocean along the coastline causing rapid reductions in the concentration of salt in seawater.”

The group’s research was conducted at the University of Washington’s Friday Harbor Laboratories (FHL). The study’s lead author, Andrew Moura, who is a graduate student in Garner’s lab at Syracuse, traveled to FHL along with Garner and researchers from Villanova University to conduct experiments with live green sea urchins. They worked alongside former FHL postdoctoral scholar Carla Narvaez, who is now an assistant professor of biology at Rhode Island College, and Villanova University professors Alyssa Stark and Michael Russell.

At FHL, the researchers separated sea urchins into 10 groups based on differing salinity levels within each tank, from normal to very low salt content. Among each group, they tested metrics including righting response (the ability for sea urchins to flip themselves over), locomotion (speed from one point to another) and adhesion (force at which their tube feet detach from a surface). In Garner’s lab at Syracuse, he and Moura completed data analysis to compare each metric.

The team found that sea urchin righting response, movement, and adhesive ability were all negatively impacted by low salinity conditions. Interestingly, though, sea urchin adhesive ability was not severely impacted until very low salinity levels, indicating that sea urchins may be able to remain attached in challenging nearshore environmental conditions even though activities that require greater coordination of tube feet (righting and movement) may not be possible.

“When we see this decrease in performance under very low salinity, we might start seeing shifts in where sea urchins might be living as a consequence of their inability to remain stuck in certain areas that experience low salinity,” explains Moura. “That could change how much sea urchin grazing is happening and could have profound ecosystem effects.”

Their work provides critical data that enhances researchers’ ability to predict how important animals like sea urchins will fare in a changing world. The adhesion principles Garner and his team are exploring could also come in handy for human-designed adhesive materials – work that aligns with the Syracuse University BioInspired Institute’s mission of addressing global challenges through innovative research.

“If we can learn the fundamental principles and molecular mechanisms that allow sea urchins to secrete a permanent adhesive and use it for temporary attachment, we could harness that power into the design challenges or our adhesives today,” says Garner. “Imagine being able to have an adhesive that is otherwise permanent, but then you add another component, and it breaks it down and you can go stick it again somewhere else. It’s a perfect example of how biology can be used to enhance the everyday products around us.”

Syracuse University biology professor Austin Garner holding a sea urchin.

CREDIT

Syracuse University

Syracuse University graduate student Andrew Moura (right) and former Villanova University undergraduate student Jack Cucchiara check salinity levels among the 10 different groups of sea urchins at Friday Harbor Laboratories.

CREDIT

Syracuse University, University of Washington

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JOURNAL

Journal of Experimental Biology

DOI

10.1242/jeb.245750 

ARTICLE TITLE

Hyposalinity reduces coordination and adhesion of sea urchin tube feet

 

Super Radar: Breakthrough radar research overcomes a nearly century-old trade-off between wavelength and distance resolution

Peer-Reviewed Publication

CHAPMAN UNIVERSITY

New interference radar functions employed by a team of researchers from Chapman University and other institutions improve the distance resolution between objects using radar waves. The results may have important ramifications in military, construction, archaeology, mineralogy and many other domains of radar applications.

This first proof-of-principle experiment opens a new area of research with many possible applications that can be disruptive to the multi-billion dollar radar industry. There are many new avenues to pursue both in theory and experiment.

The discovery addresses a nine decades-old problem that requires scientists and engineers to sacrifice detail and resolution for observation distance — underwater, underground, and in the air. The previous bound limited the distance estimated between objects to be one quarter of the wavelength of radio waves; this technology improves the distance resolution between objects using radar waves.

“We believe this work will open a host of new applications as well as improve existing technologies,” says John Howell, the lead author of the article published today in Physical Review Letters and highlighted as an Editors’ Suggestion paper (see Radar Resolution Gets a Boost). “The possibility of efficient humanitarian demining or performing high-resolution, non-invasive medical sensing is very motivating,” Howell adds.

Howell and a team of researchers from the Institute for Quantum Studies at Chapman University, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, the University of Rochester, the Perimeter Institute and the University of Waterloo have demonstrated range resolution more than 100 times better than the long-believed limit. This result breaks the trade-off between resolution and wavelength, allowing operators to use long wavelengths and now have high spatial resolution.

By employing functions with both steep and zero-time gradients, the researchers showed that it was possible to measure extremely small changes in the waveform to precisely predict the distance between two objects while still being robust to absorption losses. To an archaeologist this creates the ability to distinguish between a coin deep underground from a pottery shard.

The breakthrough idea relies on the superposition of specially-crafted waveforms. When a radio wave reflects from two different surfaces, the reflected radio waves add to form a new radio wave. The research team uses purpose-designed pulses to generate a new kind of superposed pulse. The composite wave has unique sub-wavelength features that can be used to predict the distance between the objects.

“In radio engineering, interference is a dirty word and thought of as a deleterious effect. Here, we turn this attitude on its head, and use wave interference effects to break the long-standing bound on radar ranging by orders of magnitude,” says Andrew Jordan, director of Quantum Studies at Chapman University. “In remote radar sensing, only a small amount of the electromagnetic radiation is returned to the detector. The tailored waveforms that we designed have the important property of being self-referencing, so properties of the target can be distinguished from loss of signal.”

Howell adds, “We are now working to demonstrate that it is possible to not only measure the distance between two objects, but many objects or perform detailed characterization of surfaces.”

About Chapman University
Founded in 1861, Chapman University is a nationally ranked private university located in Southern California. Chapman is categorized by the Carnegie Classification as an R2 “high research activity” institution and offers personalized education to more than 10,000 undergraduate and graduate students. The campus has produced a Rhodes Scholar, been named a top producer of Fulbright Scholars, and hosts a chapter of Phi Beta Kappa, the nation’s oldest and most prestigious honor society. Based in the city of Orange, Chapman also includes the Harry and Diane Rinker Health Science Campus in Irvine. In 2019, the university opened its 11th college, Fowler School of Engineering, in its newest facility, Keck Center for Science and Engineering. Learn more about Chapman University: www.chapman.edu.

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JOURNAL

Physical Review Letters

DOI

10.1103/PhysRevLett.131.053803 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Experimental study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

Super Interferometric Range Resolution

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

2-Aug-2023

ERGONOMIC PPE

A more holistic and efficient way of testing PPE

Molding devices to humans

Business Announcement

DOE/SANDIA NATIONAL LABORATORIES

 

IMAGE: MICHAEL OMANA AFFIXES A MASK TO THE CURRENT GENERATION OF THE 3D PRINTED HEAD WHILE TESTING AT SANDIA NATIONAL LABORATORIES. view more 

CREDIT: CRAIG FRITZ/SANDIA NATIONAL LABORATORIES

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — A team at Sandia National Laboratories has developed a faster and more comprehensive way of testing personal protective equipment, or PPE. The basic principle: modeling a device to fit the human form and human behavior.

When COVID-19 hit, PPE testing became an urgent need. In March 2020, when the country went into lockdown, many people turned to Sandia for PPE testing support. They were trying to bring new masks to the market, provide quality assurance for imported masks and vet cleaning processes for reuse of single-use PPE.

“Whether using in-house or commercial filter test systems, we found the testing process was very time-consuming and not as efficient as it could be,” said Michael Omana, an aerosol scientist at Sandia.

The team, which includes engineers Todd Barrick and Brad Salzbrenner, was determined to find a better solution. They were trying to think of ways that respirators could be tested rapidly, not destructively, and have other testing capabilities introduced, including going beyond testing the filtration material.

The old way of testing
The current method for testing PPE involves attaching a mask to a flat plate inside a box, using hot wax or putty, and then introducing a test aerosol to measure penetration levels. To achieve certification from the National Institute for Occupational Safety, 20 masks of the same type must be tested. That has proven to be time-consuming. During the pandemic, it resulted in a massive testing backlog for the respirator industry.

However, the team said time was just one issue. The current process doesn’t take into account other factors in mask use.

“All you are doing is testing the filter media itself,” explained Barrick. “It doesn’t test geometry, how the respirator fits on a face, how it’s moved on and off multiple times, how the straps perform, how the nose bridge performs, how the mask can wear over time.”

There was also the issue of reuse of PPE. With such a worldwide shortage, frontline workers were forced to reuse respirators designed for single use. However, there was no standard method of testing mask reuse.

“I think there were a lot of lessons learned with everyone suddenly looking at what the industry standards were,” Omana said.

A new idea

The team had a new idea to speed up the process and make it more effective.  They started by creating a model of a human face that could be loaded into a commercial filter test system.

“We wanted quicker testing and to look at more features, like how does the mask fit on a face,” Salzbrenner said. “We used 3D printing capabilities to make it more pliable, like skin.”

Once the mask is affixed to the form, the tester applies pressure to give an airtight seal and then introduces the aerosol.

But the team agreed even more could be done. The current testing standards don’t take into account how a real person might wear a mask and the gaps or flaws that a mask might present in real-life conditions. So, they developed a more complex version using a complete human head.

Once the mask is affixed, the entire head is put in an airtight box that is then placed in the machine and tested, allowing for a more natural flow of air over the mask and what they believe is a more realistic picture of mask performance.

The mechanical engineers on the team then took things one step further to help address the reuse of PPE, something there is currently no testing standard for.

“We developed the chamber version to automate donning and doffing (the putting on and taking off of an item) to test respirator function over time, a predominant factor in wear on a mask. It also mimics how a mask is set on the face and shows you any gaps that air and particles can get past,” Salzbrenner said.

The team said this can be used in addition to the other testing models they created or developed to be an all-in-one tester. All of which would be a big advance in the way PPE is tested in the U.S. as well as other countries.

“I call it holistic testing,” Omana said. “It takes into account all of the aspects of the mask. Aerosols are like electricity and take the path of least resistance. Even if the filter media is doing great, if another subcomponent is failing, the PPE can be rendered useless. Current testing standards do not quantitatively test PPE in a real-use capacity. This emulates the real-world use of PPE.”

What’s Next  
The team is now working to further test their approach with the help of $100,000 in funding from Sandia’s Technology Maturation Program. The goal is to license out the science to a company that can produce it on a commercial level. That is part of Sandia’s tech transfer initiative.

Necessity is the mother of invention
The saying “Necessity is the mother of invention” is no truer than in this instance. This invention was created during one of the most impactful pandemics in history, at a time when countless lives were at stake. And like so many times before, when the world has a problem, those at Sandia try to tackle it.

“Without the diverse capability of people at Sandia, a project like this would not have happened.” Salzbrenner said. “If you look at the background of each of the people on this team, everyone comes from a different discipline or walk of life. It was a combination of all these people who made these things happen.”

“As a national lab, we are fortunate to have some of the brightest minds, and with that expertise we felt it was our responsibility to do something to help the community,” Barrick added.

The team said one of the best parts of this project is that it happened organically.

“Everyone just jumped in to help,” Barrick said. “When we needed an answer, someone would say, ‘I know who can answer that.’ We would contact that someone and they would get involved. The amazing thing about this is that people donated their time. People worked more than was asked of them, to help solve this problem. It really was out of the goodness of their hearts. This was a call to action.”

The current N95 testing method requires a mask to be attached to a flat surface using hot wax or putty. (Photo courtesy of the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health)

CREDIT

Courtesy of the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health

One of the first versions created by the team to test performance of a mask on a human face. The testing device drops down and compresses the mask with 50psi.

CREDIT

Michael Omana/Sandia National Laboratories

Gen 2 integrates a more human-like form for testing. (Photo by Adam Hammond-Clements)

Gen 2 test fixture integrates a more human-like form that is integrated with commercial filter testers.

CREDIT

Michael Omana/Sandia National Laboratories

The team’s mechanical test fixture that supports reuse testing, including donning cycles, speed, and mask displacement.

CREDIT

Adam Hammond-Clements/Sandia National Laboratories

showing mechanical test fixtur [VIDEO] |