Professor Keehoon Kim and Ph.D. candidate Jaewon Byun from the Division of Mechanical Engineering at POSTECH (Pohang College of Science and Know-how) have developed an “Clever Autonomous Wiping and UV-C Disinfection Robotic” able to automating hospital disinfection processes. This analysis was carried out in collaboration with Korea Institute of Science and Know-how (Sangrok Oh, Director of Analysis Division, and Dr. Jinwoo Jung), the Korea Institute of Robotic and Convergence (Goobong Chung, Vice President, and Dr. Youngho Choi), Elphoton Co., Ltd. (Eunhyun Park, CEO, and Dr. Kyungmin Kim), and the An infection Management Staff at Pohang St. Mary’s Hospital (Jaemyung Kang and Eunjung Kim).
The COVID-19 pandemic has underscored the essential significance of thorough disinfection, notably inside hospital environments. Given the elevated consciousness of the significance of disinfection, considerations surrounding labor shortages attributable to bodily fatigue and threat of publicity to pathogens have been raised. Furthermore, people’ compliance with manually carried out disinfection duties tends to range, and human efficiency is inconsistent. Moreover, current applied sciences, reminiscent of UV-C robots and hydrogen peroxide vapor methods, have inherent limitations in utterly eradicating contaminants hidden in obscured or hard-to-reach areas.
To handle these challenges, the analysis crew developed an autonomous robotic able to each navigating hospital environments and performing disinfection duties. A key characteristic of the robotic is its twin disinfection system: first, it makes use of a robotic manipulator to bodily wipe surfaces and take away contaminants; second, it employs UV-C irradiation to disinfect hard-to-reach corners and slender areas.
The robotic’s efficiency was validated via real-world testing at Pohang St. Mary’s Hospital. The crew carried out bacterial tradition experiments to substantiate the effectiveness of disinfection and carried out repeated autonomous operations to confirm its long-term usability in scientific settings.
One of many robotic’s most important benefits is its skill to automate time-consuming and repetitive disinfection duties, enabling healthcare professionals to dedicate extra consideration to affected person care. Moreover, in contrast to variability in human efficiency, the system can carry out disinfection with constant precision, considerably lowering the danger of an infection inside the hospital. Precision management algorithms reduce operational failures, whereas the mixing of a self-sanitizing station and wi-fi charging system ensures sustained disinfection operations.
Professor Keehoon Kim emphasised, “Though COVID-19 has transitioned into an endemic part, it stays important to organize for future pandemics. We’ll proceed advancing this disinfection robotic expertise past hospitals to public amenities, numerous social infrastructures, and on a regular basis environments to additional cut back an infection dangers.”
This work was supported by the Nationwide Analysis Basis of Korea(NRF) grant funded by the Korea authorities(MSIT) (Undertaking Director: Dr. Sang-Rok Oh, Korea Institute of Science and Know-how).