Engineers from the University of Massachusetts Amherst responded to a request for help in fighting the COVID-19 pandemic from Baystate Health in Springfield by designing new, longer control cables for ventilators and the elimination of battery power sources. The design changes, developed by a team of electrical and computer engineers, allow medical personnel to control the ventilators at a distance and without using personal protection equipment (PPE), and they provide a more reliable source of power.
The UMass Amherst team is made up of Christopher V. Hollot, professor and department head at the department of electrical and computer engineering (ECE); Baird Soules, a senior lecturer and Shira Epstein, a lecturer, both at ECE. Other contributing members are ECE alumnus Tom Kopec; Jeremy Paradie, an undergraduate; Scott Glorioso, president of The Battery Eliminator Store and son of former UMass ECE professor Robert Glorioso; and Chris Denney, CTO at Worthington Assembly in South Deerfield, Mass.
Hollot says these two projects really were a team effort. “This engineering response spanned the greater UMass family including alumni, undergraduate, the computer science engineering community, local industry and faculty.”
Baystate Health’s resident physician Mat Goebel initially contacted the electrical and computer engineering department (ECE) to fabricate a 25-foot control cable for their ventilators. The existing cable length is less than 10 feet. The engineers determined that longer cables did not exist and that the original shorter cables are extremely backordered. They also found that a key part of the design, the connectors, is proprietary.
The UMass Amherst team is made up of Christopher V. Hollot, professor and department head at the department of electrical and computer engineering (ECE); Baird Soules, a senior lecturer and Shira Epstein, a lecturer, both at ECE. Other contributing members are ECE alumnus Tom Kopec; Jeremy Paradie, an undergraduate; Scott Glorioso, president of The Battery Eliminator Store and son of former UMass ECE professor Robert Glorioso; and Chris Denney, CTO at Worthington Assembly in South Deerfield, Mass.
Hollot says these two projects really were a team effort. “This engineering response spanned the greater UMass family including alumni, undergraduate, the computer science engineering community, local industry and faculty.”
Baystate Health’s resident physician Mat Goebel initially contacted the electrical and computer engineering department (ECE) to fabricate a 25-foot control cable for their ventilators. The existing cable length is less than 10 feet. The engineers determined that longer cables did not exist and that the original shorter cables are extremely backordered. They also found that a key part of the design, the connectors, is proprietary.
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