A research paper by LU Yukun, a doctoral student from the School of Mathematical Sciences at the University of Science and Technology of China (USTC), won the Best Paper Award at the Shape Modeling International (SMI 2024) conference held in Detroit, USA in July 2024.

Picture of the Best Paper Award (Image from LU et al.)

Having been held for more than 20 sessions since 1997, the SMI conference is a flagship international conference in the field of three-dimensional digital modeling. One of the highlights of the SMI conference is the presentation of awards to recognize outstanding contributions to the field. Only one paper will be selected for the Best Paper Award at each conference.

Overall, Lu’s paper was based on a study led by Prof. LIU Ligang from USTC, in collaboration with the Singapore University of Technology and Design, Nanjing University of Information Science and Technology, and Changi General Hospital in Singapore. To address the poor mask fit issue, the paper proposed using the finite element method (FEM) to develop a computational approach for designing custom-fit PAP masks such that they could achieve better mask fit performance in terms of mask leakage and comfort. Positive airway pressure (PAP) therapy referred to sleep disordered breathing treatment that uses a stream of compressed air to support the airway during sleep. However, many patients were intolerant of the treatment due to poor mask fit.

Experimental results on real subjects showed that the designed custom-fit PAP masks were able to achieve better mask fit performance than a generic PAP mask and custom-fit PAP masks designed by a state-of-the-art approach.

Computational design of custom-fit PAP mask (Image by LU et al.)

Paper link: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cag.2024.103998

(Written by LI Qige, edited by HUANG Rui, USTC News Center)