Posted November 4, 2014

 

By Seshadri Ramkumar

 

LUBBOCK, Texas – Johns Hopkins University and the nonprofit global health organization Jhpiego recently hosted an Ebola Design Challenge to harness JHU’s brain power the develop improved protective gears for health care practitioners who work in the Ebola zone in West Africa.

 

According to Ann LoLordo of Jhpiego, four products were selected for funding provided by the State of Maryland’s BioMaryland Center to design and develop effective protective gear prototypes.

As stated in the JHU’s HUB, the four projects deal with:

 

1. Cooling of personal protective equipment;

2. Rapid and safe removal of personal protective equipment;

3. Non-personal protective equipment patient isolation units; and

4. Low-cost, easy-to-use protective gear for those who take care of Ebola patients.

 

The aim of the program is to utilize the seed money to attract commercial partners to take the products developed to the market place.

 

Jhpiego and JHU’s Center for Biomedical Innovation & Design organized the timely design challenge.

 

Dr. Seshadri Ramkumar is professor of Countermeasures to Chemical and Biological Threats, Nonwovens & Advanced Materials at Texas Tech.