Experimental evaluation of particle exposure at different seats in a single-aisle aircraft cabin

Abstract

During the COVID-19 pandemic, exposure to particles exhaled by infected passengers in commercial aircraft cabins has been a great concern. Currently, aircraft cabins adopt mixing ventilation. However, complete mixing may not be achieved, and thus the particle concentration in the respiratory zone may vary from seat to seat in a cabin. To evaluate the particle exposure in a typical single-aisle aircraft cabin, this investigation constructed an aircraft cabin mockup for experimental tests. Particles were released from a single source or dual sources at different seats to represent particles exhaled by infected passengers. The particle concentrations in the respiratory zones at various seats were measured and compared. The particle exposure was evaluated in both a cross section and a longitudinal section. Leaving the middle seat vacant to reduce particle exposure was also addressed. In addition, the velocity fields and air temperatures were measured to provide a better understanding of particle transport. It was found that the particle exposure at the window seat is always the lowest, regardless of the particle release locations. If the passenger seated in the middle does not release particles, his/her presence enhances the particle dispersion and thereby reduces the particle exposure for adjacent passengers. In the cabin mockup, the released particles can be transported across at least four rows of seats in the longitudinal direction.

Airborne transmission of COVID‐19 virus in enclosed spaces: An overview of research methods

“…Meanwhile, by releasing particles produced by sandalwood combustion rather than real virus‐laden particles, Kong et al 114 evaluated the performance of a ventilation system against the exposure of healthcare workers to SARS‐CoV‐2 through a series of experiments. Li et al 115 sought to analyze the airborne exposure mechanism of the virus in an aircraft cabin experimentally. They evaluated the exposure to virus‐laden particles by releasing DEHS droplets in different locations in the cabin.…”

Evaluation of SARS‐COV‐2 transmission and infection in airliner cabins

“…Therefore, it is necessary to validate the CFD simulation results. Experimental data from Li et al 30 in a single‐aisle aircraft cabin were used for validation in the present study. The data includes distributions of airflow, air temperature, and particle concentration.…”

“…The two main approaches for studying droplet transmission in an aircraft cabin are experimental measurements and computer simulations. Experimental measurements can provide realistic and reliable information, [29][30][31] but it can be prohibitively expensive to build mockups that represent various aircraft models and to reproduce the distribution of full-size particles. Compared with experimental methods, computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations are inexpensive, and aircraft cabin models and boundary conditions can easily be changed in CFD.…”

“…To verify the accuracy of the Lagrangian method in calculating the particle dispersion, this investigation used the method to simulate the dispersion of 1‐μm particles in accordance with the experimental settings of Li et al 30 Those researchers 30 had calculated the dimensionless particle concentration, C*, by: where is the particle number concentration at a sampling point, ; is the particle number concentration in the air supply; and is the nominal exhaust particle concentration without considering particle transmission loss, . Figure 3C compares the measured and predicted particle distributions.…”

Recent progress on studies of airborne infectious disease transmission, air quality, and thermal comfort in the airliner cabin air environment

“…Beneke et al 146 measured a roughly 37% decrease in particle concentration with each successive row in the longitudinal direction from the source in a cabin mock‐up. In a cross–section with very strong mixing, experimental measurements by Li et al 147 in a cabin mock‐up found that the particle exposure for the passenger in the window seat was always the lowest, regardless of the particle source location. The researchers also found that particles from a passenger can be transported across at least four rows of seats in the longitudinal direction, which was much farther than the distance of two to three rows stated in earlier literature.…”