The COVID-19 pandemic may have forced our students to leave Case Western Reserve University’s campus, but many of them are taking what they learned at CWRU and applying it in areas of greatest need in their community.

Alex Wang, a sophomore Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering student, felt the call to contribute his experience to the pandemic efforts in his hometown of Seattle. He is working with a small startup, Maker Mask, to develop and manufacture 3D-printed respirator masks for those on the frontlines of the pandemic.

According to Wang, part of his role has been to set up and optimize a small staff to get a factory of around 30 machines running. “The plan is to use our platform, makermask.com, to encourage people to start similar small batch production facilities, with the one based at our church as the alpha test case."

The plan is working, as a recent release from Maker Mask announced that their open source 3D printable protective mask has been approved by the NIH for all general community applications outside of the direct healthcare setting. That includes front-line service providers, such as law enforcement, fire and rescue and other emergency response workers, as well as essential service providers including grocery, delivery, transportation and other supporting services.