Analysis of hygienic face mask patterns for young people

Abstract

The hygienic face mask is a useful textile product for individuals, which covers the wearer’s nose and mouth. One of the hygienic face mask’s performance requirements is a close fit between the mask sheet and the wearer’s facial contours. The present study proposed an optimal shape and size for a mask sheet pattern that provides a sheet with high fit performance for a large number of people. The study experiments analyzed a variety of patterns: i.e. three types of two-dimensional (2D) pattern (i.e. second, third or fourth rings) were used to expand the face mask area to cover the wearers’ nose and mouth (first ring), and were analyzed based on three-dimensional (3D) coordinates of participants’ facial contours (n = 132) with closed mouths. Subsequently, the analyzed patterns were used to make prototype mask sheets from nonwoven fabric. The fit performances of the face mask sheets were tested using a 3D analyzer. It was difficult to provide high fit performance at all measurement points; therefore, a range of 3 SD in the analyzed pattern was calculated with the aim of fitting more people with 100% precision. The results showed that a number of wearers, i.e. 91.7% (second ring), 93.2% (third ring) and 90.2% (fourth ring), had 100% precision. Moreover, the second ring pattern had the smallest 3 SD amount. These results show that the shape and size of the second ring pattern was most appropriate for young Japanese people with closed mouths.