Research Article

CFD modelling of airborne virus diffusion characteristics in a negative pressure room with mixed mode ventilation

School of Mechanical Engineering, Vellore Institute of Technology, Chennai, Tamil Nadu 600127, India

^* e-mail: harish.r@vit.ac.in

Received: 10 January 2021
Accepted: 12 March 2021

Abstract

COVID-19 caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) has accounted for huge collateral damage and as the virus is spreading faster and faster this study deals with isolation rooms or negative pressure rooms with 12 or more air changes per hour and maintaining a pressure difference of 2.5 pa which can help in reducing the transmission of the virus from affected to not affected persons. ANSI/ASHRAE/ASHE Standard 170–2008 recommendations are followed for hospital applications, to facilitate effective ventilation. These negative pressure rooms prevent the spread of the contaminated particles to the surroundings and by creating a negative pressure in the room whenever the door is opened the atmospheric air is sucked in and not the one which is present inside the room. The Computational fluid dynamics simulations are performed to investigate the diffusion of airbone virus inside a negative pressure room with mixed mode ventilation system. It was identified that the mixed mode ventilation system is more effective in controlling the spread of virus droplets inside the room