Non-Technical Update...and We're Goin' Pickin'!

As Kelly mentioned, the technical team has laid out a great plan for the semester.  On the non-technical side, we've identified a few appropriate peer-reviewed journals to shoot for down the line.  Our focus moving forward will be to continue gathering more information on the nature of the cold chain.  A big question came up in our meeting with Dr. Shah this week: where is it appropriate to assume that a person will be around to check on the vaccines?  If we put in a sensor that has some kind of alarm go off, will someone be around to take the appropriate action?  Or will our PCM box sit in the middle of an airport or in a cold room unattended, allowing the vaccines to overheat/freeze?  These are the questions we'll have to consider.

The non-technical side has also started to explore all the different markets that use the cold chain.  A few we stumbled upon  were food, blood, and a whole lot of pharmaceutical products.  


Here is a startling statistic:
Based on a recent study conducted by PharmaCommerce, seven of the ten top global pharmaceutical products in 2014 will require cold-chain handling.

(You can read the full press release here.  I emailed the folks at PharmaCommerce to see if we can get a hand on the report: "Cold Chain Biopharma Logistics Sourcebook 2010")

In the next week, the team plans to gather more information on pricing of sensors, continue preparing for the ice box experiment, and research more existing cold chain technologies. And to top it all, we finally set a date for our team social: Friday, October 22nd!  We are tentatively going apple-picking (maybe pumpkin-picking would be more appropriate?)  No matter what we do, it should be a really good time!  


-Veena

Technical Update

The technical team has gotten off to a good start this semester. At our first meeting, we discussed potential PCM geometries and configurations, deciding to test variations on two general ideas: an outer lining and shelves. These will be studied both theoretically, through modeling in COMSOL, and experimentally, through our ice-insulation tests. We also touched upon the door placement - be it on the side or on the top of the box. The main debates revolved around efficiency and functionality, but we deferred this decision until it could also be confirmed through COMSOL and practical experimentation.

As an update from our last meeting, we discussed the various proposed experiments to be performed using the ice and styrofoam box assembly. We hope to find results regarding a temperature gradient with respect to depth from a cold source; determine that the PCM loses latent energy prior to the rest of the compartment decreasing in temperature; measure the temperature variation within the compartment if one side is subjected to a cold source; and determine the temperature effect if one face is left open to the ambient environment (i.e., simulating an open door).

We also began to model the geometries in COMSOL and continued research into the heat transfer modeling, specifically regarding phase change processes.

Sept 5-11

Priorities:

- NSF!!

- Meet with Dr. Shah

- Set up meeting with Roosevelt

- Each person find one grant we can apply for

PR Subgroup Goals

- Outreach

- Create a list of grants

- Education program (up and running!)

- Conferences (one Maryland, one non-Maryland)

First Post

Welcome to the Team FRESH blog! Here we will be updating our progress on our project. Feel free to leave comments and suggestions!

Team FRESH