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    Where to Sit in a Car and Which Windows to Put Down to Prevent COVID-19 Transmission

    By American Association for the Advancement of Science2 Comments4 Mins Read
    Aerosol Particles Car
    A new study looks at how airflow patterns inside the passenger cabin of a car might affect the transmission of SARS-CoV-2 and other airborne pathogens. Using computer simulations, the study looked at the risk of aerosol particles being shared between a driver and a passenger in different window configurations. Redder shades indicate more particles. Risk was shown to be higher with windows closed (top left), and decreasing with each window opened. The best case was having all windows open (bottom right). Credit: Breuer lab / Brown University

    Airflows inside passenger cars and implications for airborne disease transmission.

    A new series of computational fluid dynamics simulations suggests that, for two people who must travel together in the same passenger car, the safest way to prevent possible transmission of COVID-19 in such a risky, enclosed environment is to do so with all four windows down and the passenger seated as far as possible from the driver, in the rear seat on the opposite side.

    Varghese Mathai and colleagues found that this modeled configuration created two distinct flows of air in the car’s cabin, separated along the midline of the car and moving — perhaps counterintuitively — from the rear towards the front of the car, due to exterior pressure differentials dictated by the car’s aerodynamics. This separated airflow configuration was the most effective at reducing the transmission of simulated infectious droplets from either driver to passenger, or vice versa.

    However, recognizing that such a breezy configuration may be less desirable for many travelers, the researchers also tested the opposite scenario — all four windows up — as well as four other scenarios with either one or two windows closed. The fully enclosed scenario, which relied only on simulated, non-recirculated airflow from the car’s air conditioning system, was the riskiest of all six simulated scenarios, conferring the highest risk of droplet transmission.

    Car Windows Airflow
    A study published recently in Science Advances looks at how airflow patterns inside the passenger cabin of a car might affect the transmission of SARS-CoV-2 and other airborne pathogens. The simulations produced some potentially counterintuitive findings. For example, one might expect that opening windows directly beside each occupant might be the simplest way to reduce exposure. The simulations found that while this configuration is better than no windows down at all, it carries a higher exposure risk compared to putting down the window opposite each occupant. “When the windows opposite the occupants are open, you get a flow that enters the car behind the driver, sweeps across the cabin behind the passenger, and then goes out the passenger-side front window,” said Kenny Breuer, a professor of engineering at Brown and a senior author of the research. “That pattern helps to reduce cross-contamination between the driver and passenger.” Credit: Breuer lab / Brown University

    Traveling with three open windows fared better than only two open windows, but the researchers found that choosing which window to close may in fact matter a great deal. In scenarios that simulated either an infected driver or an infected passenger, closing only the window closest to the non-infected person conferred the greatest protection, second only to the scenario with all four windows open.

    Mathai et al. note that their simulations, based on an idealized model sedan patterned after the body shape of a Toyota Prius, may not accurately reflect airflow dynamics in other vehicles such as trucks, minivans, and cars with an open sunroof. They also note that their models may also miss some other nuances of airflow and particle residence times that may result from, for example, strong crosswinds or otherwise exceptionally windy conditions.

    All the same, the authors conclude that “these results will have a strong bearing on infection mitigation measures for the hundreds of millions of people driving in passenger cars and taxis worldwide, and potentially yield to safer and lower-risk approaches to personal transportation.”

    For more on this study, read How Airflow Inside a Car May Affect COVID-19 Transmission Risk.

    Reference: “Airflows inside passenger cars and implications for airborne disease transmission” by Varghese Mathai, Asimanshu Das, Jeffrey A. Bailey and Kenneth Breuer, 4 December 2020, Science Advances.
    DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.abe0166

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