a new study says six feet of separation doesn’t stop the spread of covid-19 indoors without the use of additional control measures.
the study, conducted by the penn state department of architectural engineering and
published in the journal sustainable cities and society
, examined three factors: the amount and rate of air moving through an indoor space, the airflow pattern associated with different methods of ventilation and the aerosol emission mode of breathing versus talking.
“we set out to explore the airborne transport of virus-laden particles released from infected people in buildings,”
said gen pei
, first author of the study and a doctoral student in architectural engineering at penn state. “we investigated the effects of building ventilation and physical distancing as control strategies for indoor exposure to airborne viruses.”
the team also compared the movement of tracer gas, commonly used to test air-tight systems, against respiratory aerosols small enough to carry covid-19.
“our study results reveal that virus-laden particles from an infected person’s talking — without a mask — can quickly travel to another person’s breathing zone within one minute, even with a distance of two meters,” said donghyun rim, corresponding author of the study and an associate professor of architectural engineering.