How human respiratory physiology and the transport phenomena associated with inhaled airflow in the upper airway proceed to impact transmission of SARS-CoV-2, leading to the initial infection, stays an open question. An answer can help determine the susceptibility of an individual on exposure to a COVID-2019 carrier and can also provide a preliminary projection of the still-unknown infectious dose for the disease. Computational fluid mechanics enabled tracking of respiratory transport in medical imaging-based anatomic domains shows that the regional deposition of virus-laden inhaled droplets at the initial nasopharyngeal infection site peaks for the droplet size range of approximately 2.5–19 \documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$$\upmu $$\end{document} μ . Through integrating the numerical findings on inhaled transmission with sputum assessment data from hospitalized COVID-19 patients and earlier measurements of ejecta size distribution generated during regular speech, this study further reveals that the number of virions that may go on to establish the SARS-CoV-2 infection in a subject could merely be in the order of hundreds.
【저자키워드】 Translational research, Respiratory tract diseases, Fluid dynamics, biomedical engineering, 【초록키워드】 susceptibility, Infection, Transmission, droplet, sputum, airway, COVID-2019, nasopharyngeal, Inhaled, distribution, hospitalized COVID-19 patient, infectious dose, Transport, subject, domain, help, virion, transmission of SARS-CoV-2, initial, the disease, determine, question, reveal, proceed, the SARS-CoV-2, 【제목키워드】 nasopharynx, Inhaled, Transport,