Aerosol emission and superemission during human speech increase with voice loudness.

ABSTRACT: Mechanistic hypotheses about airborne infectious disease transmission have traditionally emphasized the role of coughing and sneezing, which are dramatic expiratory events that yield both easily visible droplets and large quantities of particles too small to see by eye. Nonetheless, it has long been known that normal speech also yields large quantities of particles that are too small to see by eye, but are large enough to carry a variety of communicable respiratory pathogens. Here we show that the rate of particle emission during normal human speech is positively correlated with the loudness (amplitude) of vocalization, ranging from approximately 1 to 50 particles per second (0.06 to 3 particles per cm³) for low to high amplitudes, regardless of the language spoken (English, Spa

SUBMITTER: Asadi S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6382806 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature