Cho'iik

Each year, close to 4 million people die because household air pollution. (OMS, 2016)

Almost 99% of the global population are exposed to air pollution levels that put them at increased risk for diseases including heart disease, stroke, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, cancer and pneumonia. (OMS, 2022)

The air quality indoors can be 5 times more risky because of a bad ventilation compared to the outside  (EPA, 2019)

In average 90% of our time is spent indoor, with the pandemic insolation this value may increased (EPA, 1989)

The people who lives in cities are the most exposed since 70% of greenhouse gases are generated there (Austin Blackmon)

The UN calls air pollution as "silent killer"

Currently more people die from diseases developed by air pollution than by covid-19

I Believe that this project can be apply globally but now all the investigation and solutions are based in mexican population that lives in cities especially in the center zone 

As we spend most of our time indoor and this air can be almost 5 time more polluted than the outside I crated a solution called Cho'iik, it is a midle-temperature ceramic glaze that can be used in housing and office finishing as masonry, tile, floors or ceramic sculptures with the propose to purify indoor's air. It uses a mechanism called photocatalysis, a simple and natural mechanism created thanks to the  glaze based on titanium dioxide and zinc oxide, which generates photocatalysis when it is on direct contact with the sun. It can be apply in several superficies depending in the indoor's space needs and in within couple of hours the people will be surrounded be clean air free of CO2, NOx, Sox and COV

The construction sector is one of the most polluted, no just in the extraction of resources, it spreads PM during it's life time, exposing all the people around, that's why the importance of building more sustentable, the building industry is an high demand sector that is no ending any time sooner, it doesn't matter if it is on develop or developing counties, the need of housing is a need that grows as the population increase, and now is up to us to make it in a greener way. 

The investigation points that the best glaze designed until now by me is able to reduce 47% of PM10 and 35% of PM2.5 with a 6 hours sun exposure. This percentages may increase with a bad indoors' air circulation and more sun expotion. I strongly believe this efficacy may increase with your help and knowledge. 

Fist of all as the users breath fresher air their risk of getting heart disease, stroke, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, cancer and pneumonia increase. 

It can me used in public places with a lot of currency as office, schools, hospitals, airports and even more privet places as home since the pandemic made us to stay much more time here. This ceramic glaze has the opportunity to be apply in different areas depending in each indoor place needs.

This project is basically though for improving the lives of people living in cities, since 70 % of greenhouse gases are there and every day more and more people migrates to cities to get better opotunities in life for their selfs and theirs families.

This is a a non-invasive zero maintenance project which allows the users to carry out their daily activities without having to modify their routine.

And not forgetting to mention that this protect reduces the energy consumption of air purifying items that seek to reduce indoor's air population now a days.

Since I was a little girl my grandma teach me my hands where a tool that can change the world that surround me, that I have a talent and I have the opportunity to decided to use in a right or a wrong way.When I was a kid my grandma taught me to create beautiful thing as crafts and since then I haven't stoped, going from painting, sewing, knitting, cooking, redesigning my room over and over again, until I found ceramic 4 years ago, it felt like home. I love doing beautiful clay stuff but at the end it felt like some else was missing, I know doing nice thing can make people happy but I knew I can give more to their lives. That's way I join the investigation line. 

In the other hand I came from a farmer family, they always teach me to respect the earth and (steer) at it's beauty, to see that natures have already the answer of everything, you just need to be patient enough to find it. That's why I what to study a Biophilic Design Master 

All my life I have done volunteer work, try to help people that surrounds me, and as a curious woman I was always thinking what else can I do fro helping them and in university they tell us that if your work doesn't help others you should stop doing what you are doing, you most think in the people in needs. Until I find a problem that affect us all, it doesn't matter if you are rich or poor, white or black, woman or man, a kid or an elder, 99% of the population is exposed, and when I realized that I couldn't do nothing.

So I decided to put all my talent in a something that actually can make a difference, make beautiful thing, respect nature, learn from it and put it to the benefit of others.

I'm a really curious women, I love learning new things the whole time and with the motivation mention earlier I want to put my knowledge and talent in the service of others. I have got involve in a couple of graduates in order to understand the problem, one called "the health effect of climate change" by Harvard University and other called "glaze chemistry" by the profesor David Zimbrón; I got in touch with academics in different areas related to my investigation and I'm still hungry for more information in order to be able to present people the best alternative possible.

That's why something that start as a scholar project at university during I was studying Industrial Design continues it's investigation until today. All this project start at the beginning of the quarantine in Mexico, and I have collected information from different interior spaces principally in Puebla , my hometown, but know I move to Brazil in order to get to know more realities and create a better solution that can be apply in more contexts in order to help much more people, now a days I have analyze more than a hundred indoor places in both counties, I have listened the opinion and needs of the people who uses these spaces and I would like to be able to analyze more places around the world to nourish my proposal.  

As the population grows the demand of more things grows, the emissions increase and the exposure to more contaminants raises as well, decreasing the quality of life of the people exposed. 

We have got to a place where been ecofriendy is not more an option, it is a way of living everybody should be, in order to prevent our extinction.

In order to be able to help people, this project need not just financial help by raising money to be able to buy more and better material, this project needs the help of intellectual people that can help taking better samples and analyzing the data in a better way with better tools. 

I really believe in this project but I can't keep doing by myself, and if I what to give the people the best alternative to purify their places I have to partnership with the bests institutions, and I belief the MIT has the equipment and talent team that can help me to help more people in the most viable way.

I found a problem, I found a need and I feel the obligation to solve it, the question here is do you want to join? 

Nature already have the solution of the problems that surround us and with modern technologies this project seek to biomimicry a current problem and create an solution in the artificial world letting it be applied in places where nature has not room, it takes nature's knowledge to our daily life through a solution with zero maintenance and non reinvestment

In the world it exist not project who purify air through photocatalysis  with zero energy use (during it's life time) and zero maintenance 

The impact goal for next year is finding a glaze formula which can doble to efficiency of the actual prototype. In the next five years we planed to pilot this mechanism in different scenarios as houses, offices and highly visited places and define the best possible application, obtain a patent, have a presence in ecological and technological innovation forums, get diffusion in order to raise enough funds to be able to pay for the continuous research and start making up this project to be able to start saving lives as soon as possible and reach the most vulnerable extracts

The mythology which has been guiding the project is a mix between the Creative Process from Osborn and Parners, the Scientific Method and UX.

Cho'iik's glaze formula has been tasted and redesign several times, I make samples of each formula and test it by exposing it to direct sun light in side a glass container with isolated air for 1, 3 and 8 hours taking samples of the inside air and measuring the PM10 and PM2.5 level after the explosion to validated the sample efficiency

As other Biophilic design projects, it seeks to improve the quality of life of people surround, for example if it is applied in a office for example it seeks to increase the labor performance, helps to relieve stress, reduces the rate of incapacity in the company, people have a better experience within the place, been happier, increases the value of the place, and help the company to achieve green certification.

Give rise to the development of more similar technologies that allow the creation of better housing spaces and lower production costs to increase their accessibility

Get a patent which can create new building green's standard in the construction sector 

the technology applied in this project is call photocatalization, it is a natural technology, it reproduces the mechanism that plants uses to clean air using sunlights.

When there is a photon of energy higher than the forbidden band (solar energy), the valence electron jumps to the conductivity band being trapped by two oxygens and becoming a superoxide, meanwhile, the free space in the valence band is occupied by a hydroxide (chemical compound reactive with organic and inorganic compounds), in such a way that through oxidation it is expelled as clean organic matter.

This biomimetic design look forward to increase and scale the efficiency of natural process 

now a days the project is handle just by myself but during the project grows, for the manufacturing I would like to work with the native people of my home town in Mexico since they have excellent craft manufacturing processes and it is an excellent opportunity for me to be able to support and employe people with limited resourcesI. In the financial, design, sales, communication and more areas I would like to work with any person, no matters their race, religion, sex orientation o disability I consider my self really open minded but I won't hire people just because the are part of a minority o similar, I feel it is more discriminatory to hire people just because they are part of a minority than because of their talent and who they are as people

no reenvertion needeed, non mantenance