Peter Tsai, who invented the filter material used in the N95 masks, came out of retirement and said he felt a “responsibility to help” amid a series of questions about how to use the technology.
Since leaving retirement in March, Tsai has been at the forefront of developing new ways to sterilize disposable mask respirators and increase production.
“I felt very stressed from the beginning,” he told the Knoxville News Sentinel. “I have a lot of pressure and a lot of questions.”
Tsai was able to communicate with other researchers, as well as with the interdisciplinary research group N95DECON, which tested several of their suggestions on how to sterilize the masks, and finally recommended some of their approaches.
Tsai added that since the start of the pandemic, he has lost 10 pounds, joking: “Someone said that you should get a Nobel Prize. But what I deserve is a ‘No Belly’ award. “
Tsai has become a popular hero among some Asian Americans because of his work against the coronavirus pandemic at a time when the community is increasingly reporting that people who blame them attack him.
He is a Taiwanese American who came to the United States in 1981 to obtain his doctorate.
Tsai told NBC Asian America that he himself has experienced some discrimination in the past.
“I found something like this,” he said, “but I just do my job and I think what I do is good for the community. My technology is good for humans, so no matter how they treat me, I didn’t care.” so much “.
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