ABOUT THE MILLENNIUM FELLOWSHIP - CLASS OF 2022
United Nations Academic Impact and MCN are proud to partner on the Millennium Fellowship. Over 31,000 young leaders on 2,400+ campuses across 140+ nations applied to join the Class of 2022. 200+ campuses worldwide (just 8%) were selected to host the 3,000+ Millennium Fellows.
UNITED NATIONS ACADEMIC IMPACT AND MCN PROUDLY PRESENT RATIDZO KIMBERLY MUNYIKWA, A MILLENNIUM FELLOW FOR THE CLASS OF 2022.
University of Zimbabwe | Harare, Zimbabwe | Advancing SDG 3 & UNAI 3
" I believe that whenever there arises a problem, there too is a solution. Our communities are faced by various adversities like the Covid 19 Pandemic and it is up to us, the very inhabitants of these communities to bring forth a solution. I look forward to advancing forward these problem solving skills and I believe the Millennium Fellowship is just the place to do that! "
Millennium Fellowship Project: Design of an Intelligent Aerosol Disinfectant Producing Device
On 11 March 2020, the World Health Organisation declared the Coronavirus a pandemic. COVID-19 is a disease caused by the coronavirus. ‘CO’ stands for corona, ‘VI’ for virus, and ‘D’ for disease. It is linked to the same family of viruses as Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) and some types of the common cold. Despite human efforts in surface disinfection and hand sanitization, the number of cases continues to rise. Further research on the virus revealed that the virus lingers in the air for close to 16 hours when exhaled by an infected individual. Thus, high transmissibility rates are justified in addition to the frequent mutations. Being faced with such adversity and motivation due to education 5.0, whose aims include industrialisation, research and innovation among many others, the researchers have come up with an intelligent aerosol disinfectant-producing device that will be able to produce a safe amount of disinfectant into the air, at regular time intervals, to combat the virus as it lingers in the air. By doing so, the device will purify the air we breathe and supplement human effort (sanitization, wearing of masks, surface disinfection). With more enhanced preventative measures (One of the P6 Medicine – P for Preventive), people will feel safer and more confident in the available control measures. Most importantly, it will reduce transmission rates to a greater extent, which will minimize the rates of morbidity and mortality in nations. The gadget will be placed in a commuter omnibus with less than 20 passengers. It uses the cup anemometer system, where a motor actuates it, and has a sensor and an AI-based controller (hence intelligent) to detect that the passengers have been unloaded so that it sprays and uses the car battery as a power source. The disinfectant shall be contained in a tank installed in the vehicle.
About the Millennium Fellow
Ratidzo Kimberly Munyikwa is a 21-year-old vivacious and passionate third year student, working towards attaining a BSc. Honours in Biomedical Engineering at the University of Zimbabwe. Driven by the passion to elevate herself, Ratidzo is a goal oriented and focused individual who aims to be better than the person she was the previous day. From being an active “A” student in secondary and high school, she is determined that her tertiary education should be no different. Ratidzo is also interested in Research as is testament from her participation during her first year in the University of Zimbabwe Research Week (2021) where her project “Design of an intelligent aerosol producing device: Case for Covid 19” attained third position under the theme Digital Economy, Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning. “Munyikwa Ratidzo K and Tawanda Mushiri- Design of an Intelligent Aerosol Disinfectant Producing Device-Case for COVID-19” was featured in the University of Zimbabwe 2021 Research Week Book of Abstracts (Theme 4, Abstract Number 136, pages 128-129). She also participated in the Annual Medical Research Day where the same project attained first position under poster presentations and attained the Professor J Meikle Prize. She is looking forward to publishing the research paper this year, 2022. A committed University of Zimbabwe Enactus member, Ratidzo also has the community at heart and has a problem identification, analysis and solution focused mindset. She is also part of team Edu SmartTech that came third in the Generation Unlimited Imagen Ventures Youth Challenge where they presented a project that aims to help the visually impaired child in their education and she is excited to see it being implemented in communities in the future. During her spare time, Ratidzo enjoys reading novels, watching series and playing with her dog, Bobbie.
