There is a push to find medical equipment that may be used to help COVID-19 patients. A team of young students, aged 12-15, in the Mekong Delta of Vietnam, is working on an initiative to develop a prototype for a low-cost breathing machine. 30 club members have been guided by Dariu’s technical advisors to assemble two different designs, including an open-source blueprint from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Some parts of the ventilator are 3D-printed by the students. There are groups of university lecturers, students, and researchers trying to develop the prototype in Vietnam. However, these are the youngest teens trying on a life-saving mission.
The idea is to develop an environment-friendly and floatable house that’s adaptable to seasonal floodings in the Mekong delta. The house is made of bamboo, which is popular in the countryside and equipped with smart technology. Micro:bit is used as the central controlling system to connect and control other external sensors, such as lighting, humidity and proximity, and motor servo. The humidity sensor is used to transfer a signal to the micro:bit for operating the house with up and down lifting; the light sensor for auto-lighting; the motor servo for opening/closing the main doors. The house is designed to function with automatic lifting when flooding water rises up or down. Authors: Lenh Phan, 15 years old, Mekong Delta, Vietnam Dat Tran, 12 years old, Mekong Delta, Vietnam
When looking at the container library donated by The Dariu Foundation at his schoolyard, Cuong Tran, 14 years old, told his classmate Phu Nguyen that he wished the container library were movable, so that they could move it from school to school. After studying it, they discovered that the container was too heavy and long to be movable. They then decided to develop a movable house as their summer project. Micro:bit is used as the central controlling system to connect and control other external sensors such as lighting, humidity and proximity, and motor servo. A light sensor is used to transfer a signal to the micro:bit for automatic lighting; a humidity sensor is used for watering, and pumping; a motor servo is utilized for opening/closing the main doors. The house is designed to be movable with the assistance of another motor servo. “Our dream was to make a house that’s able to fly like a drone,” said Cuong Tran. Authors: • Cuong Tran, 15 years old, Mekong Delta, Vietnam • Phu Nguyen, 15 years old, Mekong Delta, Vietnam
During the school closure, a group of students, aged 12-15, has been filling their free time by running their 3D-printers to produce little plastic parts, known as ear savers, to help health care workers taking part in the COVID-19 response. The group found the design online and received the 3D-printers with support of The Dariu Foundation, to produce ear savers, designed as ear relievers for masks that the health care workers wear. And the demand for such ear savers has been significant. The students can print four at a time, each batch taking about half an hour. With breaks, one printer can make 60 pieces per day. These students, members of Code Clubs supported by The Dariu Foundation, hope that they can send 1,000 pieces to health care workers at local district hospitals in the next two weeks, to give their ears a break from the pressure of constant mask-wearing.
A group of secondary girls recognized that waste disposal was becoming a huge problem where they live in the rural Mekong Delta area. People threw all kinds of waste into dustbins – a very common practice. They wanted to create a smarter solution. They developed a garbage truck using the micro:bit device, which helped classify solid and recyclable rubbish, before being sent to treatment factories. They got to present their device to the Deputy Head of Vietnam National Assembly Committee for Culture, Education, Youth, Adolescents and Children, the deputy head of the ICT Department of Ministry of Education and Training, and Country Director, Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia – Google Asia Pacific.