Shortly after COVID-19 exclusions came into effect almost exactly a year ago, a spate of new engineering methods was proposed to break down the virus, including robots and drones with ultraviolet light.
Now researchers are investigating another approach with the same prefix: an MIT study shows that ultrasound waves at medical imaging frequencies can cause the virus shell and nails to collapse and break in advanced simulations.
The nails, the virus component that adheres to healthy cells, can be vulnerable to ultrasonic vibrations within the frequency used in medical diagnostic imaging, MIT researchers explain in a press release.
In their simulations, researchers from the MIT Department of Mechanical Engineering modeled the mechanical response of the virus vibrations ripple through its structure over a range of ultrasonic frequencies.
They found that vibrations between 25 and 100 megahertz cause the virus shell and nails to collapse and start breaking within a fraction of a second. The simulations showed that the virus would break at the same frequencies in air and water.
Possible new ultrasound treatment for COVID-19
Although the MIT researchers emphasize that their findings are only preliminary and based on limited data, they say the research suggests that an ultrasound treatment could be developed to combat COVID-19.
‘We have proven that the coronavirus shell and nails will vibrate under ultrasonic excitation, and the amplitude of the vibration will be very large, which will produce strains that can break certain parts of the virus, which can cause visible damage to the outer shell causes and possibly invisible damage to the RNA inside, ”said Tomasz Wierzbicki, professor of applied mechanics at MIT. “The hope is that our paper will start a discussion on different disciplines.”
For their simulations, the MIT team used simple concepts of the mechanics and physics of solids to construct their computational model of the virus’ structure. Limited data, such as microscopic images of the virus’ shell and nails, were used to inform the model.
Although the exact material properties of the vein of the virus are unknown, the researchers believe that their simulation paves the way for further investigation into a new treatment for COVID-19.
“We looked at the general coronavirus family and are now looking specifically at the morphology and geometry of Covid-19,” Wierzbicki said. “The potential is something that could be huge in the current critical situation.”
Such treatment can help individuals who have not taken or cannot take the vaccine. It can also provide an alternative and a failure in the unlikely event that new mutations of the virus bypass the immunity conferred by the various COVID-19 jabs out there.